RACING NEWS: One Cool Cat is back on the classic trail after the Aidan O'Brien team uncovered an unusual excuse for the star colt's flop in last weekend's 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket, reports Brian O'Connor

The Storm Cat colt was found to have an irregular heart beat after he trailed in well behind the winner, Haafhd, but he could yet get his chance for revenge in the Irish 2,000 Guineas in 15 days' time.

A double up attempt on the Irish classic hasn't been ruled out by Haafhd's trainer Barry Hills but One Cool Cat is now being lined up for a return bout.

A series of scans and an ECG have returned "perfect" results on One Cool Cat whose irregular heart beat had returned to normal by the time he returned home to Ballydoyle on Saturday night.

However jockey Jamie Spencer's race report has given O'Brien a mental rather than physical clue as to why One Cool Cat raced so badly.

"All the scans were perfect and the only thing the vets could think of for why he ran like that was that he had some kind of trauma to his head or chest," O'Brien explained yesterday.

"The horse was very relaxed in the parade ring, cantered down well and was fine behind the stalls. So we asked Jamie if anything else had happened and he told us about how a stalls handler rushed him from behind and how the horse charged into his stall, banging his head and chest in doing so.

"One Cool Cat is a horse with a lot of nervous energy and he was one of the first loaded so what we think happened is that he got such a fright that his heart started fibrillating and having to wait for the others to be loaded didn't help him either," he added.

O'Brien's concern now is that the memory of his experience at Newmarket could have left its mark on One Cool Cat. But that won't stop him preparing the horse for the Curragh.

"It's a big relief that something has come to light and now we can look at the Irish Guineas. John Halley (Coolmore vet) will look at him every time he works and if everything is okay we'll run him at the Curragh.

"But as well as having a lot of nervous energy, One Cool Cat is also very intelligent so we hope that he doesn't remember too much the pain he must have felt at Newmarket," O'Brien said.

This weekend the classic focus will be on the Derby trials and before the O'Brien-trained favourite Yeats goes in Sunday's Derby Trial, the Ballydoyle team will be represented by Five Dynasties in the Lingfield Derby Trial on Saturday. Jamie Spencer will ride the Tralee winner and Beresford fourth on his first start of the season before his Group Two date with Yeats.

"The plan remains to run Yeats and at this stage I would say we probably wouldn't run anything else in the race," O'Brien said.

The Leopardstown authorities are hoping the weather will dry up sufficiently to allow "yielding" ground for Sunday's meeting.