Fairyhouse keen to see Tiger Roll in Irish National

OFFICIALS at Fairyhouse have not given up hope of Tiger Roll running in the BoyleSports Irish Grand National on Easter Monday.

The 11-year-old bounced back to winning ways with an incredible fifth victory at the Cheltenham Festival last week, putting behind him a winless run stretching back to the 2019

Grand National at Aintree. As his owners Gigginstown House Stud have already withdrawn him from the Aintree spectacular this year – where he would have been trying to equal Red Rum’s achievement of winning the race three times – Tiger Roll’s options now include the Bowl at Aintree, the Punchestown Gold Cup and the Irish National.

Peter Roe, general manager at Fairyhouse, said: “If Tiger

Roll shows up we’d love that. For the team at Cullentra to get him back to the form he was in – from flag-fall you could tell he was loving it.”

After a very wet winter, the ground at Fairyhouse has dried up considerably but the weather could turn again before Easter.

“January and February were the wettest two months on record since we began recording, but we’ve had a dry fortnight,” said Roe. “It’s unsettled going forward, but we’re yielding at the moment. I’m very happy.

“The support we have got from HRI and BoyleSports to keep the money at €400,000 is amazing. To get in this year you’ll be looking at [a handicap mark of] 136/137.”

On that theme Irish handicapper Andrew Shaw admitted he found it just as hard as his British Horseracing Authority counterpart Martin Greenwood to put a figure on Tiger Roll before coming up with 163.

“It was difficult [to give him a mark] as it has been mentioned by Mr [Eddie] O’Leary that he is not as good as the Al Boum Photos and Minella Indos of the world. They think he should be getting a lot more weight off them, but he hasn’t run in a chase over park fences since November 2017,” said Shaw.