Fairyhouse: Three Card Brag looks Albert Bartlett-bound after emphatic success

Wednesday: Fairyhouse

Three Card Brag was shortened to 10-1 (from 12) for the Albert Bartlett Novices' Hurdle at Cheltenham after an emphatic success in the four-runner novice hurdle, which developed into a match by halfway.

The winner was tracked into the straight by his market rival Spanish Harlem, but Gordon Elliott's six-year-old found an extra gear from the second-last and galloped clear to score by a dozen lengths under Adrian Heskin. The step up to the Albert Bartlett trip is likely to benefit this son of Jet Away, who is owned in partnership by the McNeill family and Patrick and Scott Bryceland.

Elliott's assistant trainer Ian Amond commented: "Adrian said going out that he would make the running because Three Card Brag wants further down the line. It probably wasn't ideal to have to do it because he is lazy, but the further he went the better he was. He will be better over a trip with a lead but keeping it simple today was the thing to do."

Heskin, McNeill's retained rider, stays over to ride Escaria Ten in Thursday's Goffs Thyestes Chase.

Mullins makes hay
When he got up on Wednesday morning, Danny Mullins had just one ride on a no-hoper in one of the maiden hurdles, but with champion jockey Paul Townend laid low by illness, Mullins was the main beneficiary as he partnered two of the three winners trained by his uncle Willie.

The ex-Paul Nicholls-trained Chavez did not impress with his jumping early on in the 2m beginners' chase, but the Malcolm Denmark-owned son of Yeats gradually warmed to his task and galloped on strongly on the testing ground to beat Golf Marin by 25 lengths. 

Danny Mullins said: "He put in a few sticky jumps early on, he probably lost a bit of confidence after his fall at Down Royal. If he can put his jumping together there could be more improvement to come from him. It was a nice opportunity for him, and typical of Willie, it was a nice bit of placement from him. As he warmed to his task his jumping improved."

Mullins followed up later in the mares' maiden hurdle when the lightly raced Hauturiere went right away between the final two flights to score by 15 lengths from the consistent Emily Roebling and achieve the somewhat unusual feat of winning a maiden hurdle in which she had been second the previous year.

Her trainer said: "I've always thought a nice bit of her but was just disappointed we hadn't got her head in front. Today she got her head in front on very testing ground and she'll probably stay much further. I don't know if she's good enough but she'll probably get an entry in the Grade 1 here at Easter. It's hard to know how much she'll improve for the rest of the season but I'm hoping she will."

The victory completed a treble for Willie Mullins, the middle leg coming when Sean O'Keeffe won the 2m maiden hurdle on In Excess.

Results, replays and analysis

Read more:

Cheltenham under fire for dropping £7.50 Guinness price during snooker event  

Members' Club special offer: get exclusive tips and insight FREE for one month  

For all our exclusive free bet offers and must-have daily promotions click the free bets button or go to racingpost.com/freebets. Commercial notice: This article contains affiliate links. Offers are handpicked and come from operators that our experts have first-hand experience of. Opening an account via one of these links will earn revenue for the Racing Post, which will be used to continue producing our award-winning coverage of horseracing.