Amateur race is going to the wire

BOTH Gordon Elliott and Willie Mullins can sway the intriguing outcome in the race for the Irish amateur jockeys’ championship where Jamie Codd currently leads defending champion Patrick Mullins by two winners, 38 to 36.

Wexford native Codd, who rode two winners at the Cheltenham Festival and was second on Cause Of Causes in the Grand National at Aintree, rides most of Elliott’s Bumper horses.

Unlike Mullins, champion for the past 10 years, Codd has never won the amateur title and he may find the going tough at Punchestown where Willie Mullins will be keen to put as many rides as possible the way of his son.

Codd, though, is one of the go-to amateur jockeys for all trainers, especially in the absence of Nina

Carberry.