Cloughmile a mare on the up

Cloughmile followed up her success from Gowran eight days ago with a convincing win under Adrian Heskin in the Irish Stallion Farms European Breeders Fund Mares Handicap Chase at Fairyhouse.

Backed from as big as 4/1 in a place earlier, into half those odds, the victorious daughter of Oscar had this two and a half miler in the bag from between the final two fences and a grand big leap at the last sealed a four and three parts of a length win over Our Victoria

Michael Hourgian trains Cloughmile for the Castle Six Syndicate and he said: "She's a fair type of mare and she carried her penalty well.

"She was out all last year. She got a fall in a hurdle in Listowel and broke a little bone in her knee."

Speaking of his upturn in fortunes Hourigan remarked: "When the horses are down they are down but it took us too long to find out what was wrong.

"At least they are running well now. I thought I was losing it for a while but I kept saying that they'd come back and they did.

"I had a problem with the bin that the feed was stored in. It's done and dusted now. We know what it was – it was a very small thing." (GC & EM)