Willie Mullins’s Kilcruit will have to concede weight to all bar last year’s winner Hewick but is still a general 6-1 favourite to win next week’s Tote Galway Plate.
The Willie Mullins trained horse is one of 34 entries left in the €270,000 highlight, Ireland’s most prestigious steeplechase prize of the summer.
Despite just four previous starts over fences, Kilcruit has been given a rating of 160 by the handicapper in figures released on Monday.
That is on the back of his easy Punchestown festival victory in April, as a result of which Kilcruit has been raised 12lbs.
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The former Grade One-winning bumper star subsequently finished out of the money in the French Champion Hurdle in May.
Hewick and Rachael Blackmore ran fourth in that race at Auteuil and the popular Shark Hanlon-trained star will have to defy topweight of 11.12 if he is to become the first horse since Ansar (2004-05) to win the Plate back-to-back.
Hewick’s exploits after the 2022 Plate, including winning the American Grand National, mean his rating is 12lbs higher than last year.
Weights outlined for next week’s other major €270,000 National Hunt prize, the Guinness Galway Hurdle, see another former big-race winner in the mix for a potential repeat.
Sharjah, who emerged on top in the big handicap in 2018, is topweight among 41 entries for the Ladies Day feature event at Ballybrit.
Sharjah won under Patrick Mullins five years ago and subsequently carved out a career as a prolific Grade One winner.
Another notable former winner of the race is Tudor City, who is a 16-1 shot with some firms to pull off an unprecedented hat-trick in Thursday week’s big race.
Tony Martin’s stalwart first landed the Galway Hurdle in 2019 and last year pulled off a 22-1 surprise under jockey Liam McKenna. No horse has won the race three times.
Favourite with most firms is the Emmet Mullins-trained Filey Bay, placed in both last season’s Betfair Hurdle and County Hurdle at Cheltenham. His owner, JP McManus, is chasing a third win in the race after Tigris River in 2017 and Thomas Edison three years earlier.
In other news, Tuesday’s Ballinrobe card sees the former high-class Ballydoyle runner Wordsworth make his jumping debut in the opener.
Runner-up to Hurricane Lane in the 2021 Grand Prix de Paris, and previously third to the same horse in the Irish Derby, Wordsworth is now with Josh Halley, for whom he ran at Down Royal last month.
That was off a flat rating of 106 and while that might flatter the brother to St Leger hero Kew Gardens these days, it does reflect inherent quality.
Given a reasonable round of jumping, getting the better of opposition such as the Roscommon bumper winner Weseekherthere ought to be a more straightforward exercise for Wordsworth.
Given his support for the All-Ireland winning Limerick hurling team, McManus’s runner Can’t Stop Smiling might be an aptly named winner in a later handicap hurdle.
The mare won twice over course and distance in May and can get the better of another hat-trick seeker, As Tears Go By.
