HEAVY rain at Catterick yesterday failed to dampen the spirits of Richard Guest, who sent out his fiftieth winner of the season when Move Over won the Alan Thompson 75th Birthday Novices' Handicap Chase.

"The owners of Move Over sent him to me from Ireland and all we've done is a bit of loose schooling and let him lead the yearlings, plus a four-mile hack on Redcar beach last Saturday," explained Guest.

The Brancepeth-based handler certainly succeeded where his previous trainer failed, because Move Over had been pulled up on his latest two starts across the other side of the Irish Channel, hence the odds of 14-1.

But the gelding certainly didn't perform like a total has-been, in fact jockey John Flavins, who had ridden him before in Ireland, enjoyed the luxury of easing his mount down to a walk on the run-in from the final fence.

Despite being strongly backed to even-money favouritism, The Duke's Speech was forced to pull out all of the stops to repel 66-1 chance Silver Dollars.

Every inch a fledgling chaser, The Duke's Speech took the lead three flights from the finish but as the runner-up closed in, Dominic Elsworth needed to get serious with his partner to record a hard-fought half-length triumph.

"He's very lazy at home and wants better ground," said trainer Tom Tate, who was accompanied by his son-in-law, Michael Dickinson, over from the USA to attend next week's Cheltenham Festival.

Knaresborough permit holder Kariana Key had good reason to celebrate when Merryvale Man gamely led all the way to take the Horses Mouth Handicap Hurdle.

Under a brilliantly-judged, front-running ride by conditional jockey Brian Hughes, Merryvale Man, not known for his fluent leaping, for once hardly put a foot wrong.

"He was kicked in one eye and has blurred vision, that's why his jumping sometimes let him down, but he can do it when he wants and the soft ground was fabulous for him," said Keya, who owns and bred the gelding.

There was plenty of early carnage in the two-mile Maiden Chase, ultimately won in runaway fashion by Persian Point.

So fast did Persian Point pass his rivals, it looked like he'd joined at the halfway stage, rather than set off with the field at the start of the feature £10,000 contest.

"That has been a long time coming, we bought him off Ann Duffield three or four years ago and picked up a couple of point-to-points until he broke down," revealed Sandy Forster, who trains the well-bred chestnut near Kelso.

* Queen Mother Champion Chase candidate Ashley Brook delighted connections in a racecourse gallop at Exeter under big-race jockey Paddy Brennan.

Runner-up in the Irish Independent Arkle Trophy at last year's Festival, the eight-year-old has been sidelined with a knee injury since chasing home Kauto Star in the William Hill-Tingle Creek Trophy three months ago.

''He went to Exeter, schooled over a few fences and Paddy was pleased with him,'' said trainer Kevin Bishop's wife Heather.

''I don't think they went overly fast and the ground was pretty bad but he is fairly fit now and it was really just to tighten him up that we took him."

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