Bryan Cooper weighed-in with a winner as County Tipperary trainer John Ryan maintained his remarkable summer strike rate with a double at Ballinrobe on Monday. The Templemore trainer landed both divisions of the Ballinrobe Racecourse Centenary Year Handicap Hurdle and Cooper wrapped up the double when bringing 9/2 chance Father Jed, in the trainer’s own colours, from off the pace to win division two by five lengths from Matthew Smith’s 4/1 favourite Let Her Flow. Shane Fitzgerald had earlier made all the running on the Bit View Partnership-owned 7/1 chance Kilashee to take the opening leg by a length and a three-parts from the Gavin Cromwell-trained Different Beat.
Cooper was a winner again at Down Royal on Friday where he partnered the Denise Foster-trained Realist to land the three-year-old hurdle. Cooper barely had to move on the 14/1 chance which beat the gambled-on 13/8 favourite Bell Ex One by a length and three-parts. He commented, “He has plenty of speed and he was very well schooled by Denise. I didn’t have much light but it opened up down the straight. I’d say he has got a nice engine to go forward with. He’s one to look forward to.”
