Briar Hill winning over fences at Killarney© Photo Healy Racing
Briar Hill aims to get his career back on track in the Irish Stallion Farms European Breeders Fund Klairon Davis Novice Chase at Navan this afternoon.
Trained by Willie Mullins, he looked a horse of immense potential in the 2013-14 season and was sent off the 2-1 favourite for the Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle at Cheltenham, only to fall.
He was also kicked in the face, suffering a broken eye socket, and not surprisingly lost a bit of confidence as a result.
It took Mullins a while to build him back up but just as he was approaching something like his old form in the Boyne Hurdle of 2015, he fell again.
Off for nearly a year, he was well beaten in the Galmoy Hurdle when the decision was made to go chasing in the summer.
Beaten narrowly at Galway in June, he went one better at Killarney in August and steps up in class for this Grade Three.
"He had a horrid fall at Cheltenham when he was kicked in the face and that has made life very difficult for him," said assistant trainer Patrick Mullins.
"He won his beginners' chase well but this trip (two-mile-one) might just be on the short side.
"I think later in the season he'll prove better over further, but Navan on soft ground at this time of year is a proper test, it will stand him in good stead.
"One thing he will do is improve for the run."
Henry de Bromhead fields two of the remaining three runners, in Gigginstown House Stud's Attribution not disgraced behind stablemate Identity Thief last time out, and Three Stars third in an Arkle trial at Cheltenham.
Jim Culloty 's It Came To Pass last seen when falling in the Foxhunter at Cheltenham, completes the field.
