'I wouldn't have had Honeysuckle without it' - De Bromhead draws parallels between new three-year-old academy hurdles and mares' programme

Henry de Bromhead has drawn parallels between Horse Racing Ireland’s new three-year-old academy hurdle initiative and the mares’ programme that helped bring Honeysuckle to prominence. 

The Waterford trainer said the new initiative could create similar opportunities and incentivise the purchase of otherwise overlooked store horses.

The Academy Hurdle Race Series, which will be launched at Cork on Sunday, is open to three-year-olds who have not previously raced on the Flat or under National Hunt rules and is designed to encourage the earlier training of young jumpers.

• Winners identifying as maidens? Ireland's bizarre new academy hurdles initiative is impossible to fathom 

However, the scheme has attracted mixed views, with Willie Mullins recently criticising it for the fact that race winners are not penalised and can still compete in Irish bumpers and maiden hurdles.

While acknowledging the criticism, De Bromhead believes the races could be a positive addition to the calendar.

“I'm in favour of them and I think they're worth trying,” De Bromhead said. “I know it's slightly different but I think it goes back to the mares’ programme. That initiative has opened up things and you could argue I wouldn’t have had Honeysuckle without it. If that big mares’ programme wasn’t there, a lot of these great mares that we are seeing now might not have come into the system.

Honeysuckle: star hurdler for Henry de BromheadCredit: Edward Whitaker

“So I think how I’d picture [the academy hurdles] is maybe that smaller store horse at the sales who isn’t that attractive, good ones of those might be slipping through the net, and now it gives them a market.

“I get what Willie is saying about the fact that you're still a maiden if you win one, but I suppose it's to try to get people to buy into it for the greater good of the whole game.

“It would be hard on somebody if you won one of these and then you were left with a three-year-old who would have very few options after that and would be straight into Triumph Hurdle-type races.

“It's a watching brief and things can be tweaked as we go along but I hope everybody will get behind them. It'll be interesting to see how it unfolds."

Another in broad agreement with the idea is Bagenalstown trainer Shark Hanlon, although he is reluctant to have runners due to Flat-bred pedigrees being permitted.

“In my opinion, the three-year-old hurdles are lovely, but there should be no such thing as a Flat-bred horse allowed to run in them,” Hanlon said. “I think it's a great idea for the National Hunt horses because it gives them another opening, but I wouldn’t bother having a runner in the race if there are Flat-bred horses”.

An HRI document discussing the new initiative addresses such criticism, saying: “Research shows that Flat-bred horses which remain unraced at the end of their three-year-old year do not perform well in three-year-old hurdle races. A premium will be placed on jumping in these races via race distances and hurdle positions where possible.”

Read these next:

Willie Mullins criticises Irish racing's 'extraordinary' new hurdles initiative as a 'sales ploy, nothing else' 

Horse Racing Ireland announce dates and venues for Irish Stallion Farms EBF Academy Hurdle races

HRI announces academy hurdles for unraced three-year-olds starting next season 

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