Limerick's Greenmount Park in Patrickswell will hosts the next leg of its Twilight Summer Series on Friday next.

An excellent card has been arranged, with the €50,000 Martin Molony Stakes the highlight – the eight race flat meeting is timed for a 5.25pm start, with racing afterwards courtesy of Delorentos (9.30pm).

It is a common place activity these days on the part of Ireland's top jockeys to crisscross the Irish Sea in search of good rides in both countries. However, when Limerick's Martin Molony pioneered this double jobbing action in the late 40s, he did not have the comfort of a sixty minute dash by air but rather had to endure the overnight mail boat service from Dun Laoghaire to Holyhead to link up with the appropriate train.

He survived this gruelling schedule to such effect that in 1950 he rode 116 flat and jumping winners in Ireland and 61 in England. His ability to combine both codes at the highest level yielded Irish Classics on Signal Box (2,000 Guineas) and Princess Trudy (1,000 Guineas), placed efforts in English Classics, Irish Grand Nationals on Knights Crest (1944), Golden View II (1946) and Dominicks Bar (1950), and a Cheltenham Gold Cup on Silver Fame (1951).

Three years earlier, Silver Fame had been the second leg of the most improbable double ever attempted by a jockey in the English Grand National as three quarters of an hour earlier Molony had ridden Sugar Palm to win the Hylton Handicap, a six furlong sprint in which he was up against the likes of Gordon Richards, Eph Smith, Edgar Britt and Tommy Weston. Silver Fame was then backed to favouritism but this was a Park chaser and he was caught out by Bechers Brook.

At home, his record of 94 winners in a season stood for more than 40 years until it was broken by Charlie Swan in 1992.

The four-piece Delorentos group released one of the most hotly anticipated Irish albums of 2007, 'In Love With Detail', on nascent Irish independent labl Cottage.

The band came together, inspired by boredom, creative energy, and a passion for music – obvious reference points are Pixies, The Cure, The Clash and Arcade Fire; more oblique influences slide in from most genres of music and virtually every decade since the 1950s. They tested the water on the live circuit in recent years and immediately stood out as a band capable of pulling off fresh, gutsy live performances.

With a seemingly insatiable appetite for gigging they honed their live show and began to build a reputation as a band of significant note.

With relation to all happenings at Limerick, visit www.limerickraces.ie.

As ever, At The Races (ATR) will cover the action live from Limerick. "There is a revenue stream from ATR which is small in the overall terms but becoming more significant. ATR has been hugely important to us and live TV coverage of Irish Racing is something we set out to achieve," stated Brian Kavanagh, Chief Executive of the Turf Club.

"We were able to negotiate a deal where Irish Racing was central to the coverage of the channel. People think it will keep race-goers away from the races, but while that may be true for one-off meetings, overall it brings the profile of the sport to a much higher level and it's been proven that any sport not on television is long out."

Limerick's next racing meeting after Friday isn't until Thursday, July 24th.

Eric McNamara's useful Prince Picasso (5/1) was an impressive winner of the €30,000 Braddish Builders Handicap Hurdle at Limerick, scoring from Waly's Own (9/1) and the Michael Hourigan trained Tubber Gael (3/1f).

At the same meeting, Paddy Hughes saddled 11/8 favourite Pillar of Hercules (B G Rock of Gibraltar-Sabreon) to land the featured wwss.syncreon.com hurdle.

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