Pacodali

Pacodali did well to get as close as he got to the big players in the Listed Tetrarch Stakes at The Curragh on Monday.

Held up, last of the seven runners by Connor King through the early stages of the race, the Paco Boy gelding was ridden along at the two-furlong pole behind Awtaad and Blue De Vega towards the centre of the track. He did get a little out-paced on the run to the furlong pole, but he kept to his task well, he kept on really willingly all the way to the line, closing on the leaders inside the final furlong and just missing out on third place to Embiran by a neck.

This was a really encouraging run from Johnny Murtagh's horse. The winner Awtaad could be very good, he is high in the betting now for the Irish 2000 Guineas horse, and the runner-up Blue De Vega, winner of the Group 3 Killavullan Stakes last October, was prominent in the betting for the Newmarket 2000 Guineas until he was ruled out of the race. Also, third-placed Embiran had won the 25-runner maiden on the opening day of the turf flat season at The Curragh, a race in which Pacodali had finished fifth, three lengths behind the winner. The Paco Boy gelding had been beaten at Gowran Park in the interim, but that was on heavy ground, and the fact that he was able to get to within a neck of the similarly progressive Embiran here is probably a more accurate measure of the extent by which he is progressing.

The third horse did not have a handicap rating going into this race, but the winner was rated 106 and the runner-up was rated 110, so Pacodali surpassed his rating of 85 in getting as close as he did. The handicapper raised him by 12lb for this run, which is a significant hike, but he could still be able to surpass his new rating of 97. He will be interesting wherever he goes next, and he raced here as if he could progress for a step up to a mile.

2^nd May 2016

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