Mullins and Townend land opener at Listowel Harvest Festival

Willie Mullins' Aghaboy made all in the Kerry Group 3-Y-O Hurdle at Listowel and kicked for home off the home bend.

The well-backed The Insider (6/4f) made rapid headway to get into contention approaching the straight and closed in second at the penultimate flight.

Aghaboy kept finding for Paul Townend, though, and got away from the last well to power in by two lengths at 5/2 from 7/2. Surac was seven lengths adrift of the runner-up in third at 17/2.

Townend said: "It was a good, genuine effort and he jumped well, on the whole. He has a nice, high cruising speed and stays well.

"He likes to get in (close to hurdles) but is quite good, we were trapping going to the second-last and he was good at what he did considering they are juveniles, at the end of the day.

"Even though he has had a couple of runs, he's still learning."

Aghaboy is now two from three over hurdles having won a three-year-old maiden hurdle at Ballinrobe nine days ago.

Additional reporting by Tom Weekes