New trip can see Paris secure Elusive first victory for Feane

IT is hard to believe that ELUSIVE IN PARIS has gone 13 races without winning but he can put that right in tonight’s opening Download The Free At The Races App Claiming Race at Dundalk.

Trainer Johnny Feane runs quite a few horses in claiming races and it was in this bracket last Thursday that Elusive In Paris finished third to Hes Our Music. Hes Our Music is contesting his seventh claiming race of the winter series now.

Over tonight’s trip, take Elusive In Paris to reverse the form. He gets the nap vote, Burn The Boats perhaps the chief danger to them.

This is a smart Dundalk card, with the globe-trotting GORDON LORD BYRON the main attraction in the rated sprint.

A sojourn in Arabia proved fruitless but he is markedly down in class here and might be able to pounce in a race replete with pace up front.

Gordon Lord Byron does not seem to be at his best, and the layers may smell blood now, but he is still entitled to snare an event of this nature.

There is plenty to think about in another €25,000 heat, the Visit attheraces.com Race. Andrew Balding sends ELBERETH, which has a bit on at the weights but is a tentative pick at the expense of another raider, Fire Fighting.

Balding hardly ever targets Dundalk. Elbereth is a Listed winner and seems a typically tough son of Mount Nelson.

Fire Fighting’s trainer, Mark Johnston, does not raid Dundalk with anything like the frequency he once did. The booking of Pat Smullen suggests that he is going to go close tonight.

Smullen also rides ST STEPHENS GREEN, which may be good enough in the staying maiden. This horse has a pacy page but was pretty classy in bumpers.

It could be Emmet Mullins’ first double, as stablemate BITTERN has major claims at her best in the 8.00. Blinkers are a gamble, considering she can be keen, but she has never before been eligible for a 0-65 contest.

BLINKERS

The sprint handicap is really tough and Sneezy Foster’s MADAM BOUNSKA is a shot in the dark, while blinkers might prove the difference for MANOROV in the nightcap. It is a concern that Manorov’s most recent victory – last September – was also that of the trainer Tom McCourt.

At Cork yesterday, 7lb conditional Barry John Foley was narrowly denied a double when the Ruby Walsh-ridden Bonbon Au Miel scrambled home on the nod at odds of 1/2 in the feature for Willie Mullins. “I thought I was beaten,” Walsh said.

The fine form of local trainer Eoghan O’Grady continued as Westerner Point landed the staying handicap hurdle under Phillip Enright.

Last Sunday, stablemate Mick The Jiver snared the €65,000 Navan feature.