‘Thisfella hadn’t been pointing for more than 20 yearsbut he wanted to seethe banksrace’

He wasmad forbreeding and madfor point-to-pointing. He wonthe leadingpoint-topointbreeder awardin2005 and it waslikewinningthe lotto for him

Therewas banks racinghere 70 years agoand Isaidto honour Pats and Bill it would be nice to reintroduce abanks race as theywerestaunch point-to-pointmen;theyloved it andlived forthe game In 2019, when Igot the place,Iasked the committee would therebeany chance we could have abanksrace to commemoratethe twoboys.

They came backtomea couple of weeks later andsaid theywould go ahead with it

We contactedVal O’Connell [IHRBcourseInspector] and Enda Bolger forguidance. Val came down and marked out where we should put each of the jumpsand then Enda had alooktoo.Hegaveushis thoughts on what would be good andbad ideas.

Valthen introducedusto Punchestown racecourse and they asked us to come up duringtheir festival. They took us outon their crosscountrytrack and showed us what they have.Wetookmeasurements and pictures of all the obstacles and settowork buildingour banks

Valhad told us we couldn’t build it with just soil because you would neverget it to settle properlyand therewould be falsepatches.Webuilt up the innards ofthe bankswith stone from the farmand then went with the topsoil and sods.

We broughtindiggers and it probably took us six months to build them.Every Saturdayor anyfineevening that we had, therewas abunch of fiveorsix fellas who would turn up and go at it

We were hopingtobeable to usethe bankslastyear but theyjustweren’t ready. Val came backthree months ago and said that theywere100 percentfor this season, so we arereally lookingforward to it

It’s likeachild waitingfor Christmas.Wehad alaunch lastmonth and everybodywas so enthusiasticabout it.There were aloadofyoung ladshere, which wasgreat to see

They arethe futureand we need to encouragethem to get involved

Everyone is talkingabout Sunday. Iwenttothe localfor apintand theman behindthe counter told me he was coming. Thefella beside me told him he hadn’t seenhim at the point-to-pointin20years, buthesaid‘Idon’t care, I’m goingtosee the banksrace,I want to be there.’ That’s what we want, people who haven’t been in awhile comingback outand havingabit of fun.

My wife Liz and Ilovethe point-topoints,wego everySunday. It’s adifferentbreed of people at the races.You couldn’t believethe buzz in Carrigtwohill last month. It wasa fine day, the crowdwas outand everyone wasinsuch goodformchattingand blaggarding. IsaidtoLiz cominghome that it wassomeday and hopefully we’ll have another fine daylikethat for us on Sunday. We aresoclosenow, thereare only acouple of moresleeps to go

JIMMY O’LEARYWAS TALKING TO EOGHAIN WARD