3 minute read
Willie Mullins is set for a typically busy weekend at the Dublin Racing Festival, where Galopin Des Champs, already the ante-post favourite for the Boodle Cheltenham Gold Cup in March, also takes top billing in Sunday's Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup.
The three-mile contest is the feature race of day one of the Leopardstown event, and Mullins is looking for his seven-year-old to back up December's winning return in the John Durkan at Punchestown.
Mullins recently passed 4,000 career winners and the master of Closutto is also represented by Franco De Port, 2021 Irish Gold Cup winner Kemboy, as well as last year's National Hunt Chase winner and recent Tramore runner-up Stattler.
Those four Closutton-based entrants leave just three more confirmed runners, including course-and distance winner Fury Road as the only charge of Gordon Elliott, who has won the race twice in the last three years, while Grand National candidates Any Second Now (Ted Walsh) and The Big Dog (Peter Fahy) make up the remainder of the field at this stage.
Mullins is also responsible for five of the eight possibles in the Goffs Irish Arkle Novice Chase, where Dysart Dynamo could be given the opportunity to build on his breathtaking course-and-distance success over the Christmas period.
Former Supreme Novices' Hurdle winner Appreciate It, El Fabiolo, Flame Bearer might all have a say in the outcome, while Saint Roi impressed when finishing almost 10 lengths clear of the reopposing Fil Dor to win in Grade One company on Boxing Day. Visionarian was a much closer runner-up on that occasion and is another possible, along with Joseph O'Brien's Banbridge.
Willie Mullins has won four of the five runnings of the Future Stars (C & G) I.N.H. Flat Race and this year has Chosen Witness, Special Cadeau, Fact To File and Largy Hill as possible candidates. However, it is Tom Mullins' Fascile Mode who tops the 12-strong field after impressing to win over this course and distance on debut at the end of December.
The last four winners of this have all subsequently gone off favourite for the Champion Bumper, with Gordon Elliott looking for Better Days Ahead to build upon his eyecacthing success at Fairyhouse two months ago.
