It was an excellent week of action around Britain with the semi-finals of three Category One competitions across the last seven days at Monmore and Newcastle.

There was another decent week of action over in Ireland, headlined by the win of Crossfield Matt in the opening round of the Tote Gold Cup.

Three Category One events got underway in the last week, the Ladbrokes Winter Derby and Golden Jacket at Monmore plus the Arena Racing Company Northern Puppy Derby at Newcastle.

There was an outstanding run from Yorkie Ollie on Sunday night at Clonmel as he produced a winning time just seven spots off the 575y track record.

There was a track record at Central Park over six bends for the second consecutive week, we look at that and all the other best performances form last week.

There were two track records broken last week, the 731m at Central Park on Saturday evening and the 280m at Sheffield on Sunday afternoon. We take a look at both in Performance of the Week.

It was almost back to a full house in Ireland last week after Christmas and then bad weather put pay to a lot of meetings over the past month.

Last week saw the semi-final stage of two Category One events, with the two quickest winners leading the way when it comes to the best performances from last week.