Aspen Colorado shows his class

Despite a drift in the market, Aspen Colorado got off the mark over jumps when keeping on well in the two mile maiden hurdle at Listowel.

The four-year-old son of Galileo won two bumpers for Aidan O'Brien before running ninth in the Grade One Champion Bumper at Punchestown in April.

This was his first start for Joseph O'Brien.

The 6/4 favourite (from an opening show of even money and 8/15 in the morning) raced in seventh before improving to 5th at the halfway stage. He made good headway to be almost on terms four out and led narrowly at the third last.

On the run to the penultimate flight, Sanibel Island loomed large on his outer. The leader was far from fluent there but Golden Poet in third, made a bad blunder which cooked his chance.

Once Aspen Colorado negotiated the last, he picked up well to see off Sanibel Island who was unable to reel him in and went down by three parts of a length at 5/2.

Golden Poet (4/1) kept on for third, a further seven lengths away.

Jockey Mark Walsh said: "He jumped well on the whole. He missed the second last and Jack (Kennedy on Sanibel Island) was coming to me and in fairness he stuck his head down and battled well on ground that was very tacky. It's not his ground and I didn't really travel the whole way - his class got him through.

"He'll improve a lot for today. Hopefully he can go into his novice hurdle now and keep stepping up."

Owner JP McManus' racing manager Frank Berry added: "He was workmanlike and it was nice to get it out of the way and he should improve a bit from it.

"He'd prefer better ground and we'll look for a winners' race down the road next but we're not getting carried away yet."

Additional reporting by Thomas Weekes