Paddy's Rewards Club Chase: Blue Lord eases win as Mullins dominates at Leopardstown
Blue Lord surged to victory in the Paddy's Rewards Club Chase as trainer Willie Mullins won six of Tuesday's seven races at Leopardstown.
-year-old was in the top rank of novice chasers last season for Mullins and won by 11 lengths at 2-1 from Captain Guinness (7-1).
Race favourite Chacun Pour Soi (6-4) came third after a mistake at the second fence from home.
Mullins saddled a six-timer at combined odds of 102-1.
kao, Dysart Dynamo, Facile Vega, Winter Fog and Fact To File also won for the champion trainer. 
Blue Lord started second-favourite behind his top-class stablemate and multiple Leopardstown winner Chacun Pour Soi.
However, the two-mile-one-furlong contest was run at such a pace that Chacun Pour Soi appeared to be struggling to go the gallop.
He managed to get himself into contention until the late mistake while Blue Lord travelled strongly throughout under Daryl Jacob and after battling his way to the front early in the home straight he powered clear of Captain Guinness.
Blue Lord has emerged as a potential threat to Queen Mother Champion Chase-winning stablemate Energumene.
"That was very smart, I thought they'd go too fast for him here and they did go fast," said Mullins. 
"I was looking at two and a half miles for him this year, but it looks like he could be a Champion Chase horse after that performance. Certainly the dial is coming back to two miles now rather than going out to two and a half. 
"It just means he's improving. I haven't thought about where he goes but I'm sure there is a programme there for those two-mile horses."
Mullins added that he was "absolutely delighted" with the performance of Chacun Pour Soi under Paul Townend.
"He started to put in some tremendous jumps down the back - he just met the second-last all wrong and it knocked him out of the race at a crucial time, but I was very heartened by his performance.
"Maybe he just needs to go out a bit longer in trip at his age. Paul was very pleased with how he was going, but he made the mistake and it cost him whatever chance he had."