Curragh Course Guide

A horseshoe-shaped, right-handed course with no sharp bends over two miles with a straight run-in of three furlongs slightly uphill. There are starts at five furlongs, six furlongs, six furlongs 63 yards, seven furlongs and a mile on a straight course. In any given instance pace and positional bias usually counts for more in races on the straight course than the draw.

The Curragh is lovely track. In general the round courses are very fair, but one thing I would say is that the Derby track is quite different to the Plate track. It’s quite deceptive when looking at it from the stands, but there’s an awful lot of turning on the Derby track and a low draw is definitely a help. On the sprint track, when they race up against the stand side, a high draw is always favoured to one extent or another no matter what the ground is like, as there is a gradual camber from the stand side down to the far side, so the stand side is always that bit drier. When they move the running rail out into the middle of the straight track, the draw isn’t quite as important, but high numbers are still best. Over the mile/seven furlong tracks, I don’t think there are any great biases, though they do tend to come across to the middle or even the stand side when the ground is on the soft side.

View from the saddle: Mick Kinane