Mulvany joy as homebred On The Go Again takes Irish Lincolnshire

Michael Mulvany was not only celebrating the biggest success of his training career with On The Go Again's victory in the Tote Irish Lincolnshire on Sunday but toasting winning the race with a homebred horse of his father, Larry.

Rerouted from a potential tilt at the County Hurdle at this year's Cheltenham Festival, the five-year-old found plenty late on to score at the first Irish Flat meeting of the year.

Reflecting on On The Go Again's victory, Mulvany jnr said: "It was our biggest win. For a small operation to get such a good winner, it's great. It's not easy competing with the big boys but it's nice to be up there with them."

In taking out the €100,000 spoils, On The Go Again emulated his granddam Bolino Star who won the Lincolnshire 22 years ago for trainer Sean Tracey.

Bolino Star came into the Mulvanys' hands when Larry secured the daughter of Stalker for 17,000 Irish Guineas at Goffs in November 2001 but the family were only able to breed one daughter from her - the King's Theatre mare Lady Bolino.

Mulvany jnr trained Lady Bolino to land an INH Flat race in the familiar green and pink silks of his father during an eight-race career, before she joined the broodmare band at the family's County Meath operation.

Having produced two foals for the Mulvanys, the decision was taken to send Lady Bolino to Arakan in 2012 when he was standing at Ballyhane Stud, with the resulting mating producing On The Go Again.

Of that mating, Mulvany jnr said: "We liked to try different stallions with Lady Bolino and at that time Arakan was getting winners. We just liked him at the time, he was hard enough and so we decided to use him.

"We've been breeding horses now for 25 or 26 years and we have eight to ten mares in our small operation. We still have a share in our own stallion Tough As Nails and we breed our own mares to him as well. We bred his first winner too."

Last year the 15-year-old mare delivered a colt by Knockhouse Stud resident Notnowcato and she is currently in foal to Boardsmill Stud's Kalanisi. While the Mulvanys have yet to decide on who Lady Bolino visits this year, it is likely that she will head to Boardsmill to be covered by one of their sires.

Mulvany jnr added: "We'll see what kind of foal we got from her in the next couple of weeks. Boardsmill has Califet, Kalanisi and Mount Nelson there and they're not too far away from us."

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