Zero Ten sauntered to success at Leopardstown today as the Emmet Mullins trained, his cousin David Mullins partnered gelding easily won the Red Mills Irish EBF Auction Novice Hurdle on his first run since September.

The Annette Mee owned son of Shantou had won his two previous races, both at Galway, but was today meeting race-fit rivals. However jockey Mullins always appeared confident on the six year old gelding, who moved to the front approaching the final flight, where he erred somewhat, but in the end scored easily by 13 lengths from Eviscerating

Trainer Mullins later commented “he met with a setback after the Galway win. It was a bit disappointing at the time as I thought we were going to miss our novice season.

“I'm delighted to get him back and the showed there that he hasn't lost anything with the time off.

“We'll look at the final of this series now. He's a point-to-point winner and the extra half mile in that should be right up his street.”

Quotes from Gary Carson