Review PUNCHESTOWN 7TH DEC

It was performances in the saddle that stole the show on the first day of the Punchestown December weekend on Saturday, notably the heroics performed by Wexford amateur Jamie Codd in winning the Greenhills Beginners Chase aboard Nearly A Moose.

The contest looked all over when Codd arrived down to the second last with an unassailable advantage on the Paddy Mullins-trained 6-Y-O but he met it all wrong and the partnership looked doomed. Codd was hanging on for dear life but he miraculously got back in the saddle despite his mount drifting right and coming to a virtual standstill.

Killultagh Thunder took advantage and put his head in front under Shay Barry jumping the last but Codd and Nearly A Moose regained their composure and battled back in game fashion to regain the winning advantage in the final twenty yards.

'At one stage I thought I was gone,' said the twenty-one-year-old rider, who has notching up his thirteenth success on the track, all recorded since Christmas last year.

The winner which was rightfully greeted to a rapturous reception on his return to the winners enclosure is owned in partnership by Michael McGinley, father of Irish professional golfer Paul, and former champion amateur golfer Padraig O'Rourke.

Earlier, punters were treated to arguably the ride of the year by former champion Charlie Swan when he conjured up a renewed surge on warm favourite Bentota Beach to win the Santa's Kingdom Handicap Hurdle by the narrowest of margins.

Shay Barry, successful in the opener aboard Frances Crowley's Nil Desperandum, forged 14/1 shot Balreask Lady to seize the initiative jumping the final flight and the race looked all over. But, the never-say-die ten time champion had other ideas.

Under a determined effort Swan pulled out all the stops on Michael Cullen's gelding to put his head in front where in mattered much to the joy of favourite backers.

Half-an-hour later, it was the turn of Paul Carberry to show his unlimited class in the saddle on his father Tommy's gelding Kings Glen. The pair loomed up ominously rounding the home turn alongside Coolaness and Ken Whelan but the latter asserted authority momentarily on the run down to the final flight but then Carberry began to knuckle down. To the Meathman's credit he galvanised his mount to regain the advantage in the closing stages to land the spoils by three-parts-of-a-length.

An Modh Direach made every yard a winning one under Gary Hutchinson to hold the chasing Healy's Pub by a diminishing neck in the two mile handicap hurdle prompting winning trainer Ted Walsh to remark, 'He was 27lbs lower over hurdles so I put him in this race to just see. I never thought he would win eleven races.'

Racing concluded with second reserve Murphy's Retreat (2/1-7/4f) justifying favouritism under Alan Crowe, who was switched from stable companion Good Man Again before racing. The latter finished an eye-catching 5th while The Kop End, another Roche runner, filled third place under Roche's son Padraig.