Kinross hunting Chipchase crown at Newcastle

Dual Group One winner Kinross is the star attraction in the Jenningsbet Nun Street Newcastle Open Now Chipchase Stakes at Newcastle on Saturday.

The seven-year-old has been a fantastic servant to trainer Ralph Beckett and owner Marc Chan, winning 10 of his 28 career starts to date, including successive Group One wins in the Prix de la Foret and Qipco British Champions Sprint in 2022.

Last season, the gelded son of Kingman landed his second Lennox Stakes at Goodwood and successfully defended his crown in the City of York Stakes, before being touched off when bidding for back-to-back wins at both ParisLongchamp and at Ascot on Champions Day.

Having again been saved for a late-season campaign, Kinross was originally due to make his reappearance in the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot last weekend, but he instead travels to Newcastle for what will be his first start on the all-weather since winning at Kempton four years ago.

“We just felt running over six furlongs on fast ground at Ascot would be too much for him at his age now and the extra week probably isn’t a bad thing,” said the owner’s racing manager, Jamie McCalmont.

“Starting back on a synthetic surface looks a suitable thing to do and he should be competitive. Obviously he’ll improve from the run, but we’ll see.

“If he comes out of Newcastle well, there’s no reason why you wouldn’t run back two weeks later in the July Cup, but it just depends on how he comes out of the race.

“After that, there’s Goodwood for the Lennox Stakes and there’s the Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville around that time as well, so you’ve got both of those options.”

William Haggas has saddled the last two winners of this Group Three contest in Sense Of Duty and Tiber Flow and again has a leading contender in the form of Montassib.

A winner over the course and distance on his racecourse debut in 2020, the six-year-old won the Cammidge Trophy at Doncaster on his first start of the current campaign and was last seen finishing a creditable sixth in the Duke of York Stakes.

Karl Burke is looking forward to firing a twin assault, with last year’s runner-up Spycatcher joined by stablemate Cold Case, who has been off the track since finishing fourth in the Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville last August.

“Cold Case is coming back off an injury from last year and he will definitely improve for the run fitness-wise, but he’s working nicely and we’re very happy with him,” said the Spigot Lodge handler.

“Spycatcher looks in great form and is stripping very fit and has always run well at Newcastle. I think the ground was just against him in the Duke of York last time (finished 11th) and we’ve put a line through that. He’s bounced out of the race really well.

“They’re two very good horses and if they were both fully fit, they’d be very difficult to split, probably fitness will just favour Spycatcher I would have thought, but I’d say it was a hard enough decision for Clifford Lee.”

Albasheer (Archie Watson), Ramazan (Richard Fahey) and Popmaster (Ed Walker) also feature.