Lucinda Russell hopes that Silver By Nature can strike gold in Betfair Chase
St Johnstone may be some way off the pace in the Scottish Premier League but their chairman is hoping to see his horse crack it in the big league.
Silver By Nature emerged last season as one of the most promising young staying chasers until he was put on the sidelines with a leg injury. That scuppered plans for a crack at the Scottish Grand National, a race that had been the dream of owner-breeder Geoff Brown.
Brown is also chairman of St Johnstone FC and while they will be up against it to break the hegemony of Rangers and Celtic in the SPL title race he can at least hope that his horse can mix it with the big guns. That starts with taking on Imperial Commander, the Cheltenham Gold Cup winner, in the Betfair Chase at Haydock Park on November 20th.
The eight-year-old came to the fore last year by finishing three-quarters of a length second to Dream Alliance in the Welsh National at Chepstow on December and then ploughing through the mud at Haydock two months later in the Blue Square Gold Cup to beat Our Vic by 15 lengths.
That performance had the handicapper raise Silver By Nature to 156 in the ratings, which will push him to the top of many handicaps, and has persuaded his trainer, Lucida Russell, to consider stepping up to the top level to see whether her horse has more to give.
“Silver By Nature will have an entry in the Betfair Chase. He chipped a little bone on the back of his cannon bone but it is absolutely perfect now,” Russell said. “He’s in full work and there have been no repercussions, and I don’t think there will be any.
“He really liked the track when he won at Haydock in February and those fences are quite big, which I think is in his favour. Obviously, being a Grade One race, the Betfair Chase will be more tricky but he is up to 156 in the handicap, so we will be looking at all the options.
“If the handicapper thinks he’s well handicapped and has improvement in him, then it is definitely worth going down the Grade One route. The big thing is, we have to get that first run over with and if everything were to go well, we would then start looking ahead to the Cheltenham Gold Cup. If he doesn’t turn out to be up to that level, we will be back down the handicap route.
“If he can continue his improvement from last season, we will have a really exciting horse on our hands, but even if he doesn’t, last year was fantastic and if he doesn’t make up into a Cheltenham Gold Cup horse, he will be aimed at the Haydock race again.”
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