Racing News: Ireland's major Champion Hurdle hope Back In Front is set to run on Sunday at Punchestown where the first "proper winter ground" of the jumps season is being forecast.
Back In Front is one of 17 still left in the Mongey Communications Morgiana Hurdle which could also see the long-awaited return of Davenport Milenium.
That former dual Punchestown festival Grade One winner hasn't run since last Christmas when third to Intersky Falcon at Kempton. However, the Willie Mullins-trained horse remains as short as 16 to 1 for the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham.
Back In Front, as low as 8 to 1 third favourite for Cheltenham, was a 12-length runner up to Intersky Falcon at Tipperary at the start of October, a run that trainer Edward O'Grady was yesterday inclined to ignore.
"I don't think it was a case of him blowing up but I do think he was not quite ready enough for a race as good as that. But he runs this coming Sunday and he seems in good form," O'Grady said.
Back In Front was ridden by the now-retired Norman Williamson at Tipperary, and when he bolted up at the Cheltenham festival last season.
However, as for future riding arrangements for the stable, O'Grady declared: "At the moment we will use the best available when available."
The ground at Punchestown yesterday was described as "good" but up to 15mms of rain is expected to fall on the Co Kildare track today. "It is also supposed to get quite stormy on Thursday although we don't know how much rain will be in it," reported the Punchestown racing manager, Richie Galway.
"The ground is plain, straight-forward good at the moment and I would imagine by the weekend, it will be the first time we will see ground approaching what you would expect for November," he added.
No one has been more frustrated by the going than Michael Hourigan but he could yet give the Gold Cup hope Beef Or Salmon a first start of the season in the Clonmel Oil Chase in nine days' time.
However, the first major Grade One prize for the hurdlers in Ireland this season will be the Hatton's Grace Hurdle at Fairyhouse at the end of the month and the SunAlliance winner Hardy Eustace remains on target for it.
A very disappointing second to Rosaker at Navan on Sunday, no excuse was available for Hardy Eustace's lack-lustre effort yesterday.
Trainer Dessie Hughes reported: "He is fine today and we still don't know what went wrong. He was fit from a recent run on the flat, so it wasn't fitness. The winner may be a good horse but ours was simply beaten too far out for it to be right. "At the moment the plans remains to go for the Hatton's Grace (November 30th)."
Hardy Eustace started a 1 to 4 favourite on Sunday but was being put under pressure by jockey Conor O'Dwyer with a full circuit to go, a performance that left O'Dwyer saying: "He was flat the whole way. There was nothing there."
The prospects for an all-weather racetrack in Ireland took a severe blow last evening when the board of Horse Racing Ireland unanimously decided that no funding be made available for such a project at this time.
Both Dundalk and Naas tracks have submitted proposals for an all-weather track but the lack of a suitable surface for jump racing has knocked those hopes on the head.
Instead the HRI board have agreed to ask the Turf Club to establish a working group to figure out if a suitable surface to stage jump racing safely on an artificial surface can be found.
In its recent five year plan, HRI argued that an all-weather course depended on proximity to a major urban area, the ability to stage floodlit evening racing, a left handed oval of ten furlongs and the best available surface to race on. However it also said that the ability to stage jump racing was also essential.
