Mister Meggit impresses on Aintree hurdles bow

Mister Meggit made an impressive start to his jumping career in the BoyleSports Daily Money Back Meetings EBF ‘National Hunt’ Novices’ Hurdle at Aintree.

Jonjo O’Neill jr enjoyed an armchair ride on the six-year-old, who cruised into contention down the home straight before easing to a four-and-three-quarter-length victory over Off The Jury at evens.

The Hemmings family-owned son of Shantou won his first two bumpers in fine style last term before stumbling when favourite for a Grade Two event at this venue and delighted connections by getting back on track.

Jonjo O’Neill, who trains the winner along with his son AJ, said: “You’d have to be happy with that. That was a nice race and he had a nice run around. He jumped reasonably well and is hopefully something to look forward to.

“He looked good and is an amazing horse in that he doesn’t show you anything at home, but thank God he lights up when he comes racing – the last one we really had like that was Synchronised (the 2012 Cheltenham Gold Cup winner), who also showed you nothing at home.

“He is a grand horse really. He is flat out for the first mile and then really warms up – he is nice to watch.

“We’ll see what’s around for him now – we’ll talk to Mick Meagher (racing manager) and come up with a plan. He’s a nice horse and you’d be looking forward to planning with him.”

A swift move up in class could be on the cards for Mister Meggit.

O’Neill added: “The way he is over hurdles, we’ll stick with that for the moment – he might not need to go chasing! We’ll get over today and see, today was the plan and now we could look at something like the Challow Hurdle.”

The Hemmings colours, famously carried to Grand National glory by Hedgehunter, Ballabriggs and Many Clouds, came to the fore again as Harbour Lake stayed on strongly to land the Pertemps Network Handicap Hurdle at 3-1 for Alan King and Tom Cannon.

King said: “I am very pleased. He was much more relaxed today. I thought last year he was going to be a really nice novice chaser. He schooled really well at home but just didn’t take to it on the track, so we went back to hurdles.

“He ran well at the end of last season and we have had a lovely clear run with him this autumn. We thought he would run well today and he has.

“The Pertemps Final at the Cheltenham Festival has to be an option for him. He is in the Betfair race at Haydock but that is only two weeks’ away, so I imagine that would come too quick so we could work back from Cheltenham – it’s a nice problem to have.

“He wouldn’t want a lot of racing and I’d say he would have a couple of runs before the final as that’s a nice target.”