Sebastopol sidesteps Greatwood date in favour of Huntingdon

Lacey runner had been fancied for Cheltenham feature.

Tom Lacey is keen to take small steps with Sebastopol, who heads to Huntingdon on Tuesday rather than running in the Greatwood Hurdle at Cheltenham on Sunday.

The lightly-raced five-year-old is one of 14 runners in the Integral UK Michaelmas Handicap Hurdle.

Sebastopol was one of the ante-post favourites for the Greatwood, but Lacey feels he is not quite experienced enough for a race such as that yet.

“We are keen to just take small steps with Sebastopol,” said Lacy.

“It is a good race, but he wants better ground and that is one of the reasons for not going to the Greatwood.

“We will find out if he is well handicapped tomorrow, but I just didn’t want to chuck him in the deep end at Cheltenham given how the ground is likely to be.

“We can go for nicer targets on better ground in the spring.”

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