Meade in the pink as he claims Galway Plate

Fifty two years after he trained his first winner at the Galway Racing Festival Castletown trainer Noel Meade landed the feature race The Galway Plate with Pinkerton this evening.

Having won his last two starts over two-miles, the gelding jumped and travelled nicely in mid division throughout, before jockey Donagh Meyler moved closer in fourth after three out, as last years first and second, Ash Tree Meadow and Authorized Art disputed up front.

With the latter pair fading in the straight, Meyler came wide on Pinkerton to take the rail and lead from a furlong out.

The Gordon Elliott trained duo Zanahiyr and Duffle Coat put up stern resistence inside the last 200 yards but Pinkerton held on strongly to win by half-a-length.

“It’s a huge race. The big races here are huge and this is one of the biggest ones. I thought I wasn’t going to get it and then Road To Riches popped up (in 2014)," said Meade.

“After this fella won in Punchestown we said we’d wait for here. We gave him a little break and he’s been doing everything right. We brought him to Killarney but didn’t run him as we thought the ground was too quick.

“We just let him have an away day at the Curragh and he was in great form. Donagh was very good on him. I was trying to get Sam (Ewing) off Gordon but he said we might be great friends but this is war!

“I have always had great time for Donagh. He’s a super horseman, beautiful hands and the horse jumped great for him. He was afraid he was going to get there too soon he was going that well.

“He’s been running over two miles and we weren’t sure whether he would stay,” concluded Meade.

Meade also landed Tote Handicap with Colin Keane doing the steering on board Monasterboice at odds of 9/2.

There was consolation for Elliott in Galway this evening as Lightkeeper landed the opening Maiden Hurdle at 11/1