Unaccompanied shows Cheltenham class with Festival Hurdle success

Unaccompanied, the runner-up to Zarkandar in last year's Triumph Hurdle, emerged as a serious contender for the Champion Hurdle in March when she recorded a gritty success over Thousand Stars, the even-money favourite, in the Grade One Istabraq Festival Hurdle at Leopardstown on Thursday. The feature race on the final day of the track's Christmas meeting was diminished by the absence of Hurricane Fly, the reigning champion hurdler, who was not declared at the overnight stage, but it still took a solid performance by Unaccompanied to beat Thousand Stars and Oscars Well, both previous Grade One winners with much more experience behind them. Unaccompanied's form on the Flat includes a defeat of St Nicholas Abbey, the subsequent Breeders' Cup Turf winner, over 10 furlongs back in April, but she has stamina as well as speed and stayed on well in the closing stages on rain-softened ground to win by one-and-a-half lengths as Thousand Stars tried to chase her down. The Irish Champion Hurdle on 29 January, which is also an obvious target for Hurricane Fly as Willie Mullins tries to get a run into him before the Cheltenham Festival in March, is likely to be the next test of Unaccompanied's Champion Hurdle credentials. She is now top-priced at 14-1 to become only the fourth mare ever to win the Champion Hurdle, and the first since Flakey Dove in 1994. "She was in at the deep end against proven horses like the second horse, he's a very solid, very high-class horse, but she's answered the call," Dermot Weld, Unaccompanied's trainer, said. "I would say the Irish Champion Hurdle would be a logical follow-on for her and if everything went well, logically we would look at the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham with her. "Today was an important day because we were deciding which way we went. I think she could make a very high-class stakes mare continuing on the Flat next year, but after that performance, you'd be inclined to stay jumping for the moment. "She loves to jump, which is a huge help when you get a mare like her. From the very beginning, she's answered the call well." Hidden Cyclone, one of last year's top novice hurdlers in Ireland, joined the list of possible Irish runners in the RSA Chase at the Festival when he made a successful debut over fences in the card's Beginners' Chase. John "Shark" Hanlon's six-year-old made smooth progress to take the lead before jumping the second-last, and kept on well on the run-in to beat Nearest The Pin with Shot From The Hip, sent off favourite at 13-8, disappointing as he finished a well-beaten fourth. "He'll have to improve again if he's going into Graded class, but I think he will," Hanlon said. "Andrew said he was idling halfway up the straight, and that meant that he met the last wrong. There's a "winners of one" at Fairyhouse at the end of January, and we'll see after that. "We've not really made up our minds about Cheltenham yet, I suppose he's done that well enough but if he's going to be a Cheltenham horse he's going to have to improve."