Under The Radar: McNamara mudlark enters Pertemps picture

The plan was for Alpesh Amin to be handy.  That’s how Alpesh Amin rolls: handy from early and staying on.  But the early pace was strong in the Full Circle Series qualifier at Gowran Park on Saturday, and rider Conor McNamara quickly consigned Plan A to the bin.  

The Flemensfirth gelding started off in the front ran, but his rider allowed his horse drift back in the field as the early pace warmed up, he allowed them at it up front.  By the time he got to the first flight, he was in a share of third last place.  When he jumped the third flight, he was last.   All 18 rivals in front of him.  

“I thought that Conor was very good on him,” says Eric McNamara now, father of the rider, trainer of the horse.  “He quickly worked out that they were going too fast.  Watching the race live, I wasn’t worried.  He was obviously well back in the field, but Conor always looked happy on him.  The way I looked at it, if he was good enough, he’d get into it.  If he wasn’t, he wasn’t going to win anyway.” 

Alpesh Amin got into it all right.  Still last as they started off down the back straight final time, he made his ground up on the outside, moved up in behind the three leaders as they raced around the home turn, hit the front on the near side on the run between the final two flights, and cleared away on the run-in to win impressively. 

“We knew that he was in good order going into the race,” says McNamara.  “We knew that he was fit, and he’s a very sound horse.  We had that race picked out for him for a while.  He loves that soft ground.” 

The handicapper raised Alpesh Amin by 7lb for Saturday’s win to a mark of 125.  The British handicapper will obviously add a few pounds, so that he might be high enough to get into the Pertemps Final at the , a race for which he is eligible since he finished third in the Punchestown qualifier in November. 

“He could go to if the ground came up soft,” says the trainer.  “He’s also qualified for the final of that Full Circle Series now at Punchestown.  That’s a really good initiative, a €60,000 final at the Punchestown Festival for that type of horse.  It should be a really competitive race, and we’d love to go for it with Alpesh Amin, but he won’t be going anywhere if the ground is too fast.  We’re hoping that he will develop into a good staying chaser in time.” 

The horses are going well.  Alpesh Amin was McNamara’s sixth winner from his past 30 runners, his fourth from his last 14.  That’s a strike rate of over 28% since the turn of the calendar. 

“We have a few more horses now than we used to have, and we had a few who were probably well handicapped, for different reasons,’ he says. “Conor is obviously a big part of it, and my daughter Kate is with us full-time, and the horses are in good form.” 

McNamara is no stranger to big-race success either.  He trained Ponmeaoath to win back-to-back renewals of the Kerry National in 2007 and 2008 and, four years after that, he had the 1-2 in the race with Faltering Fullback and Questions Answered.  

As well as the Kerry National, he has won some of the other big handicap chases on the Irish National Hunt calendar: the Munster National, the Paddy Power Chase, the Pat Taaffe Handicap Chase, the Tim Duggan Memorial Handicap Chase twice, back-to-back renewals with Larkwing and Questions Answered. 

And he got his first Grade One win on the board in June 2005 when he took Strangely Brown – who would go on to finish second to Sky’s The Limit in the Coral Cup at the Cheltenham Festival nine months later – to Auteuil and landed the Prix Alain du Breil under Ruby Walsh. 

Real Steel won the Paddy Power Chase at Leopardstown’s Christmas Festival last season, and he put up a big performance in the race this season to finish third behind Meetingofthewaters. 

“He ran well again all right,” says his trainer.  “He’s 11 now, but he was only 2lb higher this year than he was last year.  We’re thinking about going to the Irish National again this year, he was pulled up in the race last year, but the ground was very soft last year.  We’re also looking at the Grimthorpe Chase at Doncaster in a couple of weeks’ time. 

“That’s a race that could suit him, it’s a valuable race and there have been only seven runners in it in the last five or six years.” 

Falco Blitz is 10 now, but he was unlucky in the Tim Duggan Chase at Limerick at Christmas, he made a bad mistake at the fourth last, and he proved as much when he ran out an impressive winner of a handicap chase at Thurles three weeks ago.  He will go back to Limerick for a veterans’ race next month, and he could still be a well-handicapped horse. 

Millstream Lady is on a roll - she has won three of her last five - and Decimation should improve from his run at Gowran on Saturday, just his second run for his new trainer, when he finished fifth in Alpesh Amin’s race, and Londonofficecallin should be out again soon, when the ground gets a little better.  Storm Mahler has won on heavy, but he should appreciate some nicer ground too. 

“I think this year will be a little different to last year,” says the trainer.  “We have some nice horses coming back in the spring, we’ll have some more summer horses than we had last year.  We’re looking forward to getting them going too.”