'I'm loving it so far' - the man behind some of jump racing's biggest stars on branching out from point-to-pointers to precocious two-year-olds

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On this occasion, Martin Stevens speaks to Donnchadh Doyle about his two-year-old colt Ruler's Control – subscribers can get more great insight every Monday to Friday.

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Look out, Flat racing! Donnchadh Doyle, a mainstay of the County Wexford point-to-point scene, has broadened his horizons and begun owning and trading two-year-olds, sprinters and milers as well.

The man who regularly turns huge profits for his exciting winners between the flags – think Bravemansgame, Classic Getaway, Gentlemansgame, Jalon D’Oudairies and Romeo Coolio – is, not exactly surprisingly, making a pretty good fist of it too.

Flat horses carrying Doyle’s yellow and white quartered silks who have been sent out by his young tenant Jack Foley include the three-year-olds Incredible Army, Liberation Date and Midnight Dusk, all winners at Dundalk in the last few months, and, even more strikingly, the two-year-old colt Ruler’s Control, successful in the first juvenile maiden of the year at the Curragh on Sunday at the expense of Amo Racing’s odds-on chance Force Noir.

Asked if longer-established Flat pinhookers should be quaking in their boots, Doyle replies with a dry laugh: “I’m not sure about that, now. I’m loving it so far, but then it’s easy to enjoy it when you’re going well. It’s when you have bad days that it’s not so fun.”

Explaining how the Flat venture came about, he adds: “I’d bought a few Flat foals and yearlings and was going to give them to other lads, but then Jack came on the scene last summer, having just got a dual-purpose trainer’s licence. 

“He used to work with me when he was just starting out, before he went off to Willie Mullins and became champion conditional jockey, so I knew he was a good, straightforward lad with his head screwed on the right way.

“I’ve rented him a yard, a separate barn on the place, and we had our first runners last autumn. Liberation Date was our first winner in December and it’s gone well ever since.”

Ruler’s Control pays a handsome tribute to Doyle’s eye for incipient Flat talent. The February-foaled colt has a smart page, being a half-brother to Listed-placed Miss Maia out of Reinette, a daughter of Dansili and Prix de la Forêt heroine Etoile Montante, but he is from the penultimate European crop of Territories, a very capable sire though not the last word in fashion since he was exported to India.

Ruler’s Control after his debut victory at the CurraghCredit: Patrick McCann

He was purchased for €30,000 from the Goffs November Foal Sale in 2024, a price that was around a third lower than the average price paid at the auction that week. 

“Territories isn’t bad but, to be honest, the sire isn’t everything when I’m looking at horses,” says Doyle. “First and foremost I love to buy a good physique. It’s the same for National Hunt horses. The most important thing is getting a nice, athletic individual that can walk and, in doing so, gives a strong indication that it will be able to gallop.

“Picking the Flat horses has taken a bit of getting used to. You have to adjust your eye from looking at all those big, scopey future chasers. It’s a tricky game as it’s tough enough trying to find the horses you like, and then it’s even more difficult actually buying them as there’s always a lot of people on the nice ones. You have to work the sales hard, and be patient.”

All of the horses that run for Foley and Doyle do so with a big, bold ‘for sale’ sign around their necks. Negotiations are reportedly ongoing for Ruler’s Control since he showed so much promise at the weekend.

“They’ll be traded like the point-to-pointers – that’s the idea anyway,” continues Doyle. “We’ll try to get the best out of them and put them in the shop window. There’s been plenty of interest in Ruler’s Control in the last few days and hopefully we’ll get him sold by the end of the week.”

• Territories colt Ruler's Control ends Amo Racing’s domination of Curragh opener 

Foley is also taking some of Doyle’s pinhooks to the breeze-up sales, under the Acre House Farm banner. They include a Blackbeard half-brother to Listed winner Warnaq at Tattersalls Craven and colts by Kameko and Showcasing at Goffs UK’s fixture in Doncaster.

The flurry of Flat activity on Doyle’s place makes perfect business sense for the proprietor, and not just because it amounts to more darts being thrown at the board to make money.

“A big reason behind my decision to go further down this road is to give our staff something to do all year round,” he says. “We used to lose a lot of lads in the summer, after the point-to-point season came to an end, and they never seemed to come back. So I wanted to have something to keep them ticking over during those months.

“It’s not just about making profits, either: it’s about cash flow. It’s a long time between finishing with the point-to-pointers in May and the new season, and if you don’t have any nice four-year-olds for the November and December meetings you have to wait even longer to get some money back into the business.

Donnchadh Doyle is a shareholder in MartinboroughCredit: Elise Fossard

“On top of that it’s no bad thing to insure yourself against the point-to-points being disrupted by the weather. It seems more dramatic than ever these days. When it’s wet it’s extremely wet and when it’s dry it’s extremely dry. You can’t win.”

Doyle is becoming quite the bloodstock magnate these days, holding not only investments in National Hunt and Flat horses in training, but also stallions. He is a shareholder in Authorized and Martinborough, both of whom stand at Capital Stud in County Kilkenny.

“Authorized is a legend, everyone knows that, and Martinborough is very exciting, so it’s great to be involved with them,” says Doyle. “I’ve got plenty of youngsters by them on the ground here and they’ll come through the system. We won’t see them for a while but, then again, the years are going by fast enough these days.

“It was a nice little turn-up for the books that Capital Stud sponsored the maiden at the Curragh on Sunday. You couldn’t write it. We had some fun on the rostrum.”

Other Flat traders might be relieved to hear that the jumps will always be number one for Doyle. There’s little chance of him dealing in two-year-olds and sprinters full-time. 

“This will always just be a sideline for the spring and summer, and only for as long as it’s a profitable one, which hopefully it will be,” he says. “It’ll need to pay its way.”

Last week’s Tattersalls Cheltenham Festival Sale served as a stark reminder of the joy of pinhooking point-to-pointers, as his brother Cormac – who also operates under the Monbeg banner – sold the top two lots, Monster Truck and Palinca, for £530,000 and £400,000.

• Records broken at an extraordinary Tattersalls Cheltenham as £530,000 Monster Truck heads to Gordon Elliott 

“Cormac had all the honey last week!” his brother beams. 

There’s no sibling rivalry then? “Ah no, not at all,” is the answer without hesitation.

It sounds as though Donnchadh will have his own big paydays at the other boutique National Hunt sales to come this season anyway.

“The point-to-pointers are going grand for me,” he says. “I was a little bit behind because of the weather, and I’ve been waiting for a bit of kinder ground for a few, but those of mine that have run have run well. I’m hoping that I’ve got a few nice ones up my sleeve for the Aintree and Punchestown sales. We’ll see.”

Donnchadh is the only one of his siblings to have swapped codes. So have Cormac and his other brothers Gearoid and Sean, all dyed-in-the-wool point-to-point figures, disowned him for betraying his roots and becoming a Flat snob?

“Don’t worry, as soon as they see a bit of money coming my way with the Flat horses they’ll jump on the bandwagon too,” he says with a chuckle.

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Pedigree pick

Champion Stakes hero Sealiway has two chances of posting a first winner from his debut crop of two-year-olds in the five-furlong maiden at Marseille-Borely today (11.55 local time, 10.55 GMT) with Corbusier and Witchway declared. Both colts are trained by Patrice Cottier, the former for the sire's owner Gousserie Racing and the latter for Jean-Pierre Dubois.

Slight preference is for Corbusier, as he is a half-brother to Pastisse, who won on debut in the April of his two-year-old season and three more races later in his career for the same connections, and is out of Phoceene, a Listed-winning daughter of Olympic Glory from the immediate family of Group/Grade 1 place-getters Incanto Dream, Olendon and Zona Verde.

Sealiway’s progeny should be sharp. Although the horse is best known for winning over ten furlongs at Ascot on British Champions Day at three, he broke his maiden in the April of his juvenile season and took the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere by eight lengths later that year.

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Good Morning Bloodstock is our unmissable email newsletter. Leading bloodstock journalist Martin Stevens provides his take and insight on the biggest stories every morning from Monday to Friday.