Naas kicks off Irish flat racing season with two stakes

Betting shops are closed and the grandstands are empty, but the turf flat season in Ireland is on.

Monday, a seven-race program at Naas Racecourse will launch a season that will provide much-needed action for European flat racing fans. Racing in the United Kingdom is suspended through April, while France will not race through April 14 because of the coronavirus outbreak.

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Irish racing officials announced earlier this week that racing will continue without spectators. Evening meetings have been rescheduled for afternoons, and no horses from other countries will be allowed.

The Naas program begins at 9 a.m. Eastern or 6 a.m. Pacific with two stakes on the card - the Group 3 Park Express Stakes for fillies and mares at a mile and the listed Devoy Stakes for non-winners of a Group 1 or Group 2 race at 1 1/4 miles.

In the Park Express Stakes, Even So, a maiden race winner in her second and final start last year as a 2-year-old at Gowran Park in September, is likely to be a slight favorite over Blissful, the winner of the Ingabelle Stakes at Leopardstown last September.

Trained by Aidan O’Brien, Blissful was later sixth in the Group 2 Rockfel Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at Newmarket, England, on Sept. 27, her final start of 2019.

The Park Express Stakes will be the 4-year-old debut of Hamariyna, who won the Group 3 1000 Guineas Trial at a mile at Leopardstown last May, but has not raced since an eighth-place finish in the Naas Oaks Trial last June.

The Devoy Stakes has more of a standout runner in Sir Dragonet, who was 3-2 in future-book betting on Saturday. Trained by O’Brien, Sir Dragonet was fifth in the Group 1 English Derby last June and fourth in the Group 1 English St. Leger at Doncaster in September.

O’Brien’s son Josep, starts the well-regarded Pondus, who recently was transferred from trainer James Fanshawe and will race as a gelding for the first time on Monday. Pondus was winless in five stakes last year, including a second to Addeybb in the Group 3 Rose of Lancaster Stakes at Haydock Park in August.

Addeybb won the Group 1 Ranvet Stakes at Rosehill Gardens near Sydney Australia on Saturday.