Unbeaten chaser Sam Spinner is back and ready for a new season over fences having landed all three of his starts over the bigger obstacles last term but picked up an injury half way through the term which saw him miss the Cheltenham festival and the rest of the season.
The eight year old trained by Jedd O'Keefe has been out of the sport for some time last being seen in December 2019 at Doncaster landing the Grade Two Novices' Chase.
The gelding has been a superb yardstick for O'Keefe over both hurdles and fences, having been runner up at in the 2019 Stayers' Hurdle at the Cheltenham festival and since stepping up to Fences and handling them really well.
The team have been taking it fairly easy with the Caron and Paul Chapman owned horse after his injury which saw him pick up a problem with his Pelvis, but over the last few weeks he has been schooling and O’Keeffe plans to increase his workload in the coming weeks.
Sad news - Sam Spinner is out for the season with a pelvic injury...
— At The Races (@AtTheRaces) December 30, 2019
Wishing all the very best to the @jeddokeeffe team. pic.twitter.com/gY3XwkgovV
(Credit ATR) “He’s coming along really well and we’re very happy with him,” said O’Keeffe.“That was his first schooling session since his injury and it all went very well.
“Obviously we’re going to school him again, next time over fences – or the French hurdles we have – and hopefully he’s on target for the Charlie Hall.”
He added: “He’s extremely difficult to place. We were either looking at a big handicap with plenty of weight in a big field, or going in a race like the Charlie Hall where, he might not be good enough, but it will probably be in a small field around a track where he has won twice already. We think that is probably the lesser of the two evils.
“We’ve had a bit of rain recently so the ground should be lovely. So the Charlie Hall is the plan at this stage.”