Aintree winner Harbour Lake has Pertemps Final as season’s objective

November 11

Alan looks upon Masaccio as one of his brightest novice chase prospects for this season, and, building on his useful form over hurdles, the seven-year-old made a winning debut over fences at Newbury on Thursday.

Apart from one hiccup at the first fence in the straight, Masaccio never put a foot wrong, and he showed too much pace for market-rival Twin Jets after the last, winning by two lengths.

Alan said:”That was what we hoped for. Masaccio will get further in time because he is such a relaxed horse, but we will stick to this two and a half miles for the time being.”

And Barbury celebrations continued into the week-end, with Harbour Lake confirming the general feeling that he is happier over hurdles than he was over fences when winning the Pertemps Qualifier at Aintree on Saturday.

Despite being absent since May, Harbour Lake, who always runs well fresh, gave Tom Cannon a super ride and revived so many memories for the Hemmings family when winning his first race for two years on a track where the late Trevor Hemmings enjoyed so many magical days.

Alan said:”We had a lovely clear run with Harbour Lake this autumn, and he has now staked his claim for the Pertemps Final at Cheltenham in March. He would not want a lot of racing, so we will probably work back from the Festival and maybe have just two runs beforehand.

“We always thought that Harbour Lake would make a chaser and he schooled really well over fences at home this time last year, but he had two runs and did not enjoy it, so it made sense to switch back to hurdling.”