Go For Gold At Thurles

Piranto was never sighted for us at Fairyhouse, in rear throughout and only staying on past beaten horses to finish 8th of 16, beaten over 50L. I still am of the opinion that he could be a better horse than he has shown so far and keep a close eye on him in the market for his next few runs, especially if he is upped further in trip. Don’t delete him from the tracker just yet!

Mark Enright knows his way around Thurles.

On Thursday I like the look of one for each way purposes at Thurles, and I think Precious Gold could outrun his odds stepped up in trip for David Fitzgerald and Mark Enright. This 4yo son of Rajj, a sire with very few progeny, ran fairly well in first time cheek-pieces at Down Royal last time (16f yld) and he has shaped on a couple of occasions that he might be effective at a trip over hurdles.

His sire is unusual in that he has never seen the track, but he has sired a couple of useful types on the level including Insayshable and Group 3 placed I’m So Fancy. He has yet to produce a winner over timber but his half brother Amberjam was a dual 3 mile hurdle winner for Oliver Sherwood last season and another half bro of his, Johnny Owen, also scored over hurdles at 2 miles.

That gives a bit of hope regarding today’s trip of 23f at Thurles and there is also cause for optimism on the dam side of his pedigree. She herself stayed at least 10f on the level and she has a half brother, Karajan, who won twice at 20f and who was placed at 24f. So, from a pedigree point of view, Precious Gold looks well worth a crack at this trip over hurdles and a couple of his previous runs suggest it too.

He produced arguably one of his most promising efforts on his hurdling debut at Roscommon (16f yld), held up in rear and staying on well to finish 5th of 13 beaten just over 10L for the win. The 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th and 8th from that contest have all gone on to win hurdle races since so it was a more than decent debut. He wore a tongue tie for the first time that day and that was discarded for his next three maiden hurdle runs and he was unsurprisingly well beaten.

The tongue tie reappeared for his handicap debut off 88 at Limerick back in July (16f gd) but he ran a poor race to ultimately finish well beaten. He was given a mini break after that underwhelming effort and he looked a lot more promising last time with first time cheekpieces added to the tongue tie off a mark of 86 at Down Royal (16f yld). He kept to the task well that day, if looking a little one paced, and on the evidence of that effort a step up in trip looks the obvious move.

The cheekpieces and tongue tie are retained at Thurles and Fitzgerald has booked Mark Enright for the ride. Danny Mullins rode him last time but 9st 11lbs is right on the limit for him these days so Fitzgerald has turned to Enright who will have no problem making weight. He has yet to ride for Fitzgerald but he knows Thurles well and he has 4 wins and 25 top 4 finishes there from 88 rides. Hopefully he enhances that fine frame hitting strike rate on Precious Gold on Thursday who I think is worth chancing each way for small stakes at odds of 33/1.

STEVOS’ SELECTION: 16.45 THURLES-PRECIOUS GOLD E/W @ 33/1 (5 places Betfred)