Lucinda Russell, Britain’s most northerly-based trainer at Perth & Kinross, looks to potentially have a very serious racehorse on her hands in the shape of the rapidly progressive Brindisi Breeze, who fairly hacked up at Haydock at the weekend in the Grade 2 Albert Bartlett Novices Hurdle and looks a major player in the Grade 1 race of the very same name at the Cheltenham Festival next month, writes Elliot Slater.
Russell has been plying her trade with plenty of success over the years, but in Brindisi Breeze she looks to have a horse who could take her and her partner Peter Scudamore to all the major meetings over the next few seasons. A gelded son of National Hunt sire sensation King’s Theatre, the six-year-old is unbeaten in three outings over hurdles having failed by just a head to make a winning start to his career under rules when unluckily beaten just a head, (having nearly fallen on the home turn), in a bumper at Musselburgh in November on his racecourse bow. People looking at the Cheltenham 2012 betting will have to take him seriously.
A victory at the first time of asking over hurdles at Kelso in December over two-miles-seven-furlongs was followed four weeks later by making every yard to slam the opposition over three miles in soft ground at Newcastle, a performance that made locals at the Gosforth Park circuit sit up and take notice. Stepped up in class at Haydock on Saturday, Campbell Gillies’ mount once again ran his rivals ragged on testing ground and was never in danger in beating Wincanton winner Harry Topper by an eased-down 12-lengths, a victory that had layers running for cover as they slashed the Scottish raider to a best priced 12/1 (from 33’s), to win at Prestbury Park in the race that precedes the Cheltenham Gold Cup on March 16. While many will be focusing on the Betfair Gold Cup Betting, Brindisi could be one to watch.
If he gets some cut in the ground, Brindisi Breeze could very well make the likes of market principals Fingal Bay and Boston Bob look to their laurels.