Lord Church and Ronan Whelan. © Photo Healy Racing
The Michael Halford and Tracey Collins trained Lord Church justified favouritism when bringing up his hat-trick in the Silken Thomas And Lock 13 Handicap at the Curragh.
A well backed winner at Limerick on his three-year-old debut last month, the Churchill gelding followed up in a stronger contest at Cork recently.
Again ridden by Ronan Whelan on this occasion, the 7/2f was always travelling nicely just off the pace before being produced with a well timed challenge inside the final furlong.
For a few moments early in the straight, it looked as though Declan McDonogh had stolen the race from the front on Blackcastle Storm The latter extended from over two furlongs out, opening up a couple of lengths on his field.
However, Whelan was equal to the task, moving closer to chase down the leader before edging ahead over 100 yards out. At the finish, he had three-quarters-of-a-length to spare over Blackcastle Storm.
On winning three in a row Halford commented: “It's a hard enough thing to do.
“He got into a little handicap mark last year. He's a very big horse and he was weak last year so he found a good mark for himself and progressed well over the winter.
“We're lucky he has a good patient owner and thank God the races have come up and fallen right for him.
“He was quite buzzy as a two-year-old and it took us a good while to get him to relax and switch off, he does it well now. He saves some fuel and it helps him that he's not winning too far.
“The plan was the first two races and then I said to Brian (Gallivan) we'd play it by ear with him. He's probably due a break now and then we'll see where we go from there.
“He'll probably get another furlong in time but we won't be too hard on him. Brian has no intention of moving him on so we'll have him for a while I hope.
“There was a good dig in the ground the day he won in Limerick, he did well to plough his way through that. It was lovely ground in Cork and beautiful out there tonight.
“For a big horse he's a good actioned horse, so he's versatile.”
Additional reporting by Gary Carson.
