Spreyton trainer Mark Ganderton doubts that promising galloper Incat, winner of the Class 2 Handicap on his home track on Sunday, will ever fulfil his true potential.
“He’s a real handful,” Ganderton said after the five-year-old came from last — with jockey Kelvin Sanderson getting a freakish inside run — to snatch his third win in 11 starts.
“He could make a reasonable horse — a decent stayer — if he’d grow up, but he won’t.
“That’s why he’s had so many gear changes.
“I’ve got a nose roll on him, and a winker on one side, to try to get him to relax and race more genuinely.
“He was going to flash home last start but he was too busy hanging in.
“There’s no doubt that being able to stay on the rail all the way helped him.”
Although Ganderton expects Incat to work his way through the classes, he doubts that the horse is up to Devonport Cup standard.
“I’m not sure that he’s good enough to win a race like that _ we’ll leave the Devonport Cup to his stablemate Catwen Boy,” the trainer said.
Catwen Boy, who ran second to Dream Flyer in last season’s Devonport Cup, returned to Ganderton’s stables on Monday to start a new campaign.
Incat and Catwen Boy are both raced by prominent North West Coast businessman Robert Milne.