Winged Leader has "come of age" and gains 1st racecourse win Winged Leader followed up on point-to-point wins at Kirkistown and Farmacaffley when impressively justifying even money favouritism in the Hamilton Architects Hunters Chase at Down Royal. Regular rider and three time champion point-to-point jockey, Barry O’Neill, was in the plate on David Christie’s runner. Winged Leader led, and he was joined three out. The promising six-year-old led again two out, asserting before the last, to easily account for Alpha Male. Eight and a half lengths separated them. "He has really come of age this year. Last year myself and Barry (O'Neill) took quite a lot of stick when he got beat a couple of times,” said Christie. "He was nearly kind of bolting and running away. It would have been so easy to turn him into a horse that you could only run flat out with. "We rode him out the back, and rode him out the back, and a couple of times we let him down when he got there to win it and he just came second, and we took a lot of stick about it. "It was the making of him. That's a year in getting him settled, there's a lot of work has gone into that horse - from Barry riding him to ourselves at home. "He's only a six-year-old and he is a proper horse. I have ambitions with him. The whole thing with him was never to get too carried away and just take it wee steps at a time. If we did that, the horse would come to us. If we did the opposite we would ruin him. "I'm delighted for the horse and for us. "In a normal year you would be thinking of the Joseph O'Reilly or Punchestown. He is ready for that but now we are in a situation where we don't know what we are doing with plans. "It is great that he has put that under his belt now - great for him, great for the owners and for us to have something to build on." (MG & EM)
