Ballagh Star

The eight-year-old is trained by Mrs Y Dunleavy, whose yard has sent out just one winner this season — so Ballagh Star is carrying a fair bit of the stable's hopes on its back. The horse got its career off the mark at Sligo on 2 October 2024, and then returned to exactly the same track almost a year later to win again on 1 October 2025. That second win was only eight months ago, meaning Ballagh Star is still very much a live player rather than a horse fading into retirement.

Recent form is mixed but not discouraging. In the last six races, the results read 12th, a non-completion, then a win, a second place, and a third — so three of those completed runs ended with Ballagh Star in the first three. That is the profile of a horse that competes honestly and finds the frame more often than you might expect given the overall career numbers. The 12th-place finish most recently is a blip worth noting, but with this horse, the question is always the same: is Sligo on the horizon? Because if it is, the record speaks for itself.

Shane Fitzgerald has ridden Ballagh Star five times without getting a winner, which is a minor puzzle given the horse's ability to win. Whether a change of jockey could unlock something is one of those intriguing questions that keeps racing interesting. For now, Ballagh Star remains a lightly-regarded but genuinely fascinating horse — one that has found a home at one track and proven, twice over, that it knows exactly what to do when it gets there.