Snow hit Irish card new date

YESTERDAY’S Fairyhouse meeting was cancelled when parts of the track were found to be unfit for racing following overnight snow. The meeting has been rescheduled for Wednesday, February 14. Details of the programme will be published in due course. Before the rescheduled fixture, Fairyhouse is due to race on Saturday, January 27 and Wednesday, February 7. Meanwhile, Willie Mullins has confirmed Cilaos Emery, a Grade 1 winner at the Punchestown Festival last April, is recovering from a stress-fracture and will be facing a race against time to be back in action before the end of the season. The injury was sustained when finishing runner-up to Mick Jazz in the Ryanair Hurdle at Leopardstown over Christmas. And Mullins hopes to him have back in action for Punchestown. And, while the champion trainer’s plans for his stable stars have been well publicised this week, he will also have a strong hand in the two Grade 2 bumpers (both carrying a €75,000 prize-fund) on Dublin Racing Festival weekend at Leopardstown. Hollowgraphic, an impressive winner at Punchestown and current favourite for the Champion Bumper at Cheltenham, will lead Closutton’s assault on the Goffs INH Flat Race on Saturday, February 3. And he’ll be joined in the line-up by Blackbow Box, a successful favourite on his racecourse debut at Leopardstown on Boxing Day, having won an English point-to-point. Mullins considers Colreevy, successful at 4/11 on her debut at Fairyhouse last month, his fancy for the Coolmore Mares Flat Race, the finale of the new festival on February 4.

BUSY PERIOD Mullins