Willie Mullins took his Punchestown festival haul to 14 winners this week with a 6-1 treble on Friday.
With the final day of the season still to come on Saturday, it leaves him five shy of his best-ever festival tally, set two years ago.
Dominant in both Grade One contests, with State Man victorious in the Paddy Power Champion Hurdle, and Impaire Et Passe still unbeaten after landing the Alanna Champion Novice, Friday’s results saw Mullins pass €7 million in prizemoney for the campaign in Ireland.
In front of a bumper 35,334 ‘Ladies Day’ attendance, he struck too with the handicap chase winner Kilcruit, also ridden by champion jockey Paul Townend.
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As headaches go, there are worse than the Champion Hurdle conundrum Mullins and Townend will face into in the weeks ahead.
The biggest question of all about whether reigning champion Constitution Hill stays over flights or goes chasing next season is out of their hands but leaves a puzzle about how to play their own cards.
State Man, a distant runner-up to Constitution Hill at Cheltenham last month, confirmed himself ‘best of the rest’ on Friday evening with a smooth success.
The 2-5 favourite made all to, once more, put stable-companion Vauban in his place.
Once again it is potential rather than the proven article which seems to stimulate ante-post lists after Impaire Et Passe maintained his unbeaten record in the following race.
Rarely, however, has a 1-3 favourite won a Grade One by over seven lengths and left such an underwhelming impression.
Brilliant at Cheltenham in the Ballymore, this was a performance best described as workmanlike with Impaire Et Passe making heavy weather of beating High Definition.
The latter even collided with a running rail on the run-in and in such circumstances those layers who made him a 4-1 second favourite for next year’s Champion Hurdle could hardly be described as plucky.
Townend’s immediate reaction was that Impaire Et Passe will have no trouble jumping a fence but caught the prevailing mood by adding: “But I’d say it will depend on what the horse across the water is doing as well!”
Mullins, too, said such a discussion was for another day, one that will take place in a context of State Man continuing to impress with his low-key excellence.
Unbeaten in four domestic Grade One’s this season, Barry Geraghty, the former champion jockey, perhaps summed up State Man best on RTÉ and said: “If Constitution Hill wasn’t here, I think he would be a very good champion.”
Mullins looks ready to give State Man another shot at the Cheltenham championship in 2024 and said: “He’s done enough, and we’ll freshen him up and get him back to do the same things next season.
“I can’t see him going over fences. I’d say he’ll be a hurdle horse. He’s a horse that still has improvement in him.”
In apparent presumption of the Nicky Henderson team opting to avoid fences, he added: “Constitution Hill was just brilliant [at Cheltenham] so we were happy to be second and he’s going to be hard to beat.”
The trainer was left scratching his head with Impaire Et Passe, suggesting that Cheltenham’s hill rather than Punchestown’s speed test might be key to him. Otherwise, he didn’t like much of what he saw.
“He didn’t impress me at all, I was delighted he won, but throughout the race he wasn’t impressing me. He looked like he wasn’t enjoying it and maybe Cheltenham took much more out of him than we thought,” he said.
“Turning for home, I wouldn’t have backed him, so to win after that just means that he has a huge engine. But he wasn’t really in love with what he was doing today, whether it was the ground or what I don’t know,” Mullins added.
In contrast, Colm Murphy couldn’t have been happier after Impervious completed an unbeaten ‘nap-hand’ of victories over fences this season by sluicing up in the Grade Two Glencarrig Lady Mares’ Chase.
Brian Hayes’s mount got the better of Allegorie De Vassy in a memorable Cheltenham finish last month but was utterly dominant this time as her old rival could manage only third.
“She’s been an absolute revelation and it’s amazing how much she has improved from run to run,” said Murphy.
Impervious is already a 6-4 favourite for next year’s Mares’ chase at Cheltenham, although Murphy wasn’t committing to any firm targets.
“She has loads of options and we can dream away for the summer,” he commented. “She can go up or down in trip, it doesn’t matter. She’s just a proper one.”
Emmet Mullins, who secured his first Grade One with Feronily earlier in the week, struck again when It’s On The Line pulled out a gritty defeat of Vaucelet in the Champion Hunters’ Chase.
Both the winner’s rider Derek O’Connor and Barry O’Neill engaged in a fascinating tactical battle up the straight but It’s On The Line eventually toughed it out by a length at 6-1.
“He doesn’t make life easy but there’s an engine in there somewhere,” the winning trainer said. “He just needs a bit of a lead but he’s a relentless stayer too. It’s trying to get it all to come together and it did today.”
Apart from his uncle, Emmet Mullins is the only trainer to win more than once this week.
JJ Slevin, successful on Fastsorslow in Wednesday’s Gold Cup, struck again in the novice hurdle aboard Monbeg Park.
