Geni De La Cour and Conor Clarke race away from the last as Plains Indian and Cian Quirke part company. Both were okay © Photo Healy Racing
Geni De La Cour (18/1) took full advantage of Plains Indian s final-flight fall to take the spoils in the extended two and a quarter mile maiden hurdle at Clonmel.
Plains Indian, the well punted 6/5 favourite, took over on the run to last and led narrowly from Geni De La Cour, however, he met it too early and clipped the top bar to crash out.
Geni De La Cour kept on to give Conor Clarke his first winner over hurdles. The duo came in by three and a half lengths from Whatsavailable and Darragh O'Keeffe. Housemartin was a remote third at a whopping 300/1.
Emmet Mullins said: "He is a lovely horse but it has been a frustrating road. He had a nice run for us first time in Tramore but had silly little things and a novicey mistakes and fell twice at Punchestown.
"That's Conor's first jumps winner and hopefully that might convince him to come and join us now. He has three flat winners for Ray Hackett but is going over jumps now as his weight has increased.
"He was cool there, I told him he was a free-going horse and to keep a good hold of his head and he didn't panic. He might have been losing the battle at the last but he was good and cool on him.
"It is great to the get horse back on track with numbers rather than letters and we'll take it one day at a time.
"We were due some luck as we were on the cold list for long enough - we'll take every bit of luck we can get."
Additional reporting by Tom Weekes
