Oak Vintage can be polished performer

● In-form Hamilton charge bids to land Kelso’s feature prize

Oak Vintage bids to build on an impressive recent success in the feature race at Kelso today.

A six-length scorer at Sedgefield 16 days ago, the Northumberland raider faces six rivals in the £13,000 Scotty Brand Handicap Chase over 2m 1f.

The eight-year-old is trained by Ann Hamilton and her husband and the gelding’s owner Ian, said: “He jumped like a buck at Sedgefield and Ross Chapman gets on really well with him. He won a novice chase at Kelso in November so the track suits fine. He isn’t a bad little horse and he stays a bit further than this trip as he’s won at 2m 4f over hurdles.”

Locally-trained pair Sudski Star and Chain Of Beacons are among the opposition to Oak Vintage. Harriet Graham’s Sudski Star, owned by Kelso director Geoff Adam, is a four-time course winner while Chain Of Beacons is trained near Galashiels by Katie Scott and was a course and distance winner in November.

Top-weight Double W’s, trained by Ruth Jefferson, is fresh from running in Listed company at Ayr last month with Applaus representing Micky Hammond who ended last season in terrific form.

Vastly-experienced amateur John Dawson gets the leg up on Dance Of Time in the Ferguson Planning & Development Novices’ Hunters’ Chase. Formerly a useful bumper horse, he is three from three in point to points and has Stratford’s John Corbett Cup as his target after Kelso.

Meanwhile, Charlie Appleby can loosen Aidan O’brien’s stanglehold on the Centennial Celebration – MBNA Chester Vase Stakes with Ispolini.

O’brien has won this Group Three contest for the last five years and while he fields three in the 12-furlong heat, it is Appleby’s runner who can take centre stage on the first day of the Chester Cup meeting.

Ispolini has actually already beaten O’brien’s reopposing Hunting Horn once this term, with the pair finishing second and third in the Sandown Classic Trial last month.

Just a length and a quarter separated them at the line, but given Ispolini was making his seasonal bow that day and Hunting Horn had a previous run, you would expect the Godolphin runner to make greater strides for that outing.

Ispolini won one of his two juvenile outings last year, claiming a ten-furlong allweather maiden in November, so clearly he is still a bit of a dark horse at present, despite his rating of 106.