Ante-post favourite Avant Tout has been ruled out of this month's Galway Plate after connections elected to give him a summer break.
The Willie Mullins-trained six-year-old enjoyed an excellent end to the last campaign, claiming a Grade Two novice chase at Limerick before landing a lucrative handicap at the Punchestown Festival.
An appearance at Ballybrit had been under serious consideration, but Avant Tout has instead been put away with a view to aiming at some major prizes later in the year.
Steve Massey, racing manager for the owners, the Supreme Horse Racing Club, said: "After Punchestown we were thinking about going to Galway as we know he likes good ground and he was in very good form.
"However, he's now rated 154 over fences and we just felt it would be a big ask to run in a race like the Galway Plate off such a high mark.
"We decided to give him a break and he'll come back into training in the next two to three weeks to get ready for the new season.
"We're looking at running him in either the Hennessy Gold Cup at Newbury or what was the Paddy Power Gold Cup at Cheltenham in November.
"It's very exciting to have horse rated as highly as him and we're really looking forward to seeing him in action later in the year."
