Last Monday’s Irish Grand National evoked plenty of memories for Roy Craigie, many of them from long before he enjoyed an 11-year stint as Fairyhouse general manager up to 1999.

There are few races of any significance which do not adorn Willie Mullins’ CV and, after yesterday’s Boylesports Irish Grand National, there is one less.

It is a first Irish Grand National success for Willie Mullins, who saddled the first three home.

“When he hit that hill, it was like he was doing what he was bred to do.”

An open-looking renewal of the Coral Punchestown Gold Cup is the feature on day two of the Punchestown festival.

It’s Gold Cup day in Punchestown and while I don’t know if we’ll have the race we had last year, with Sizing John, Djakadam and Coneygree providing a brilliant spectacle, it’s still a great race.

This afternoon's meeting at Fairyhouse has been abandoned because of a waterlogged track.

Last year’s Cheltenham Gold Cup winner, Sizing John, may not be here to defend his crown but trainer Jessica Harrington has an able deputy in the shape of Our Duke, who can land racing’s blue riband on the final day of another very successful Festival for Irish-trained runners.

"If it was all plain sailing it would be much too easy!"

Jessica Harrington has certainly stood the test of time, writes Pat Keane.

Kate Harrington, 27, is assistant trainer to her mother Jessica, who will have a strong team, headed by Gold Cup hero Sizing John, operating over the festive period. Kate is also a prolific winner as a jockey herself

"I started training at 42 with a six-month-old child, so it was total madness!"

Three Irish jockeys have been suspended after testing positive for traces of cocaine.

Trainer Gavin Cromwell has vowed to support Ger Fox after the Irish Grand National-winning jockey was named as one of three riders to receive a two-year ban after testing positive for a metabolite of cocaine.

Alan Potts: mining expert and Cheltenham Gold Cup-winning owner of Sizing John

He was forced out of this year's Cheltenham Festival when suffering lung and rib injuries in a fall at Kempton in February.

Barry Geraghty is set for a further three weeks on the sidelines after it was discovered he had sustained a hairline fracture of his shoulder blade in a fall at Killarney last week.

There should be no pay gap between men and women, according to broadcaster and leading race horse trainer Ted Walsh.

Galway Plate day is always a special occasion, and I’ve been fortunate enough to win the race on a couple of occasions.

The Irish Grand National had been in decline for a number of years, but one’s faith in Ireland’s premier National Hunt race was renewed by a scintillating display from Our Duke at Fairyhouse on Monday.

Irish Grand National-winning jockey Robbie Power says that horse racing’s updated Non-Trier rule means that jockeys will be riding for punters and stewards rather than horses and their connections, and admits that riders will have to be harder than they would like and risk the futures of young horses, to avoid falling foul of the regulation.

With maiden victories in the Irish Gold Cup and Cheltenham Gold Cup already safely tucked away, a remarkable season of firsts continued for Commonstown trainer Jessica Harrington and jockey Robbie Power, as Our Duke belied his inexperience to win the Boylesports Irish Grand National, and, make no mistake, did so in the style of a future Cheltenham Gold Cup horse.

Alison Williams and Lena Dunham bow out in the final episode of Girls at 10pm on Monday on Sky Atlantic.

There aren’t many boxes that Ruby Walsh hasn’t ticked in his remarkable career. The Galway Hurdle was one. Or at least it was until yesterday when Walsh produced what Willie Mullins described as a “Houdini act” to finally land the richest jumps race in Ireland courtesy of Clondaw Warrior.

The recent tradition of the Galway Plate catapulting relatively unheralded young jockeys to public prominence continued yesterday as 20-year-old Donagh Meyler steered the Gigginstown House Stud-owned Lord Scoundrel to victory in the Ballybrit showpiece.

Yesterday morning the racing world woke to the sad news that John Thomas McNamara had passed away. The 41-year-old former leading amateur, who suffered a horrific fall from Galaxy Rock in the Kim Muir Challenge Cup at the Cheltenham Festival of 2013, lost the one battle he could never win.

Dermot Weld reached a significant milestone in his long and illustrious career in Naas last night when a double, with Discipline in the listed Naas Oaks Trial and Sea Swift in the fillies maiden, saw him reach the 4,000 winner mark.

SPORT has become the life blood of communications, especially traditional television stations.

IRISH exiles in the US knew about the Easter Rising before the news reached most of their relatives back home, writes Ray Ryan.

1. Fun, Fashion and Flutters

With the kids off school for the Easter break, we took the opportunity to take a few days away to unwind after Cheltenham. 

The first of Cork’s three-day meeting takes place this afternoon, and Sr Carthage can make the most of the conditions to take the valuable Cork Handicap for Jim Bolger.