Nap of the Day: Race-fit Ribee can plunder Naas prize

There’s a little something to cater to every racing fan’s taste on Sunday, with four meetings taking place across Britain and Ireland - three over jumps and one on the flat.

Our expert has selected their Nap of the Day - a Michael Mulvany runner who goes in the Devoy Stakes at Naas.

A field of eight has been declared for this Listed contest and it’s open to horses aged four and upwards, who have never won a Group race.

Fitness can make a massive difference at this stage of the season and all bar one of the runners has been off the track for 140 days or more. The one outlier is Michael Mulvany’s RIBEE, who made his seasonal reappearance in the Irish Lincolnshire last week.

Both the winner and the second were well clear of the rest that day and the testing ground clearly didn’t bother Mulvany’s four-year-old. He was always near the leaders and arrived with a challenge in the final two furlongs, whilst travelling eye-catchingly well.

Hanging to his right in the closing stages, that didn’t stop him from coming out on top and he ran on well in the closing stages, with the rail to help him. The handicapper responded with a 9lb rise and that now leaves him on the verge of being a Listed performer.

Progressive towards the back end of last season, he managed to win a couple of lesser handicaps at Galway and Gowran and that’s usually a good indicator that a three-year-old will go on to improve the following year.

He’s entitled to step forward for the run and as that was a career-best performance, it appears that he’s an improving four-year-old. The ratings suggest he still has 10lb to find with the highest rated runner Shaool but the fitness advantage could be huge.

Speaking of Shaool, she was a very impressive winner of a Listed contest over 1m2f in testing conditions at Leopardstown back in October and deserves to be at the head of the market on that evidence. Beset was also an impressive winner in this grade last time out.

It’s quite possible that there’s more to come from Ribee however and it would be no surprise to see him follow up his major handicap victory by going in again here.

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