Last year's leading apprentices Colin Keane and Connor King are already scrapping it out for this year's title and the pair are now level on ten winners apiece, following Keane's win on Machete Mark in the New Bbq Evening Format At Naas Handicap at Naas today.

Keane, runner-up in last year's Apprentice Championship behind King, took advantage of a gap which appeared along the inside running rail to produce Machete Mark to lead a furlong out. The pair stayed on well to beat Shipyard

Afterwards winning trainer Ger Lyons stated “he travels really well in his races and is a really smart horse on his day. He's had two racecourse gallops recently and we knew he was in a good place and he got all the breaks today.

“He has an entry for the Royal Hunt Cup and there was no point going to Ascot unless he was in that frame of mind and it was a lovely day to give him a blow out.

“There was no way we were going to Ascot fresh and it was a nice pipe opener. We'll see if he's good enough now and hopefully he comes out of that okay and we'll discuss Ascot with (owner) David Spratt.”

By Thomas Weekes, quotes from Gary Carson