Blissful Moment (nearside) comes through at the last to 'do' Mr Cosmopolitan at Navan© Photo Healy Racing
You'd hardly associate the stallion Dynaformer, with Navan in January, but after his son Cause Of Causes landed the first, another of his offspring, Blissful Moment proved well up to the task in race 2, the 2013 Navan Membership Maiden Hurdle.
Odds on the J P McManus-owned victor, tumbled from at least 11/4 this morning into 15/8 as blinkers and a tongue-strap were deployed in the hope of finding race winning improvement. Another Challenge was the other one punters wanted to know about here, finding 4/1 from 14/1 earlier in the day.
Newcomer, Mr Cosmopolitan threatened to be the bookmakers savour but ultimately he had to give way to Blissful Moment who triumphed by three and three parts of a length.
Another Challenge 'missed' a few hurdles on the way around but he got the each-way money, twenty four lengths back in third.
Winning trainer Noel Meade said: "At no stage did I think he was going to win. In fairness though he probably doesn't want the ground that heavy.
"He does want further. I thought the blinkers might help to carry him along a bit." (AM & EM)
