NICKY HENDERSON reckons Buzz is making all the right noises ahead of Saturday’s Cesarewitch Handicap.
His hurdles star will make the switch to the Flat for Newmarket’s £250K pot over two miles and two furlongs, with champion Oisin Murphy booked to take the ride.
And why the Lambourn maestro is used to doing battle with Willie Mullins at Cheltenham, the pair will lock horns on the Rowley Mile this weekend, in a race jumps trainers have won five of the last seven renewals.
Henderson joked: “I’m shocked to see that Willie has the favourite! But this has been the plan for Buzz for a long time, we brought him back in early especially.
“The weather has come good for him and we’ve done all we can, he seems very fit.
“He certainly improved as a hurdler last year so whether I think he’s well-handicapped on the flat we’ll have to wait and see – but I’m hopeful.
“We’ve got Oisin to ride and we’ve had him in the stalls on Monday morning just to get used to them again.”
Irish ace Mullins has trained the last three winners of the Cesarewitch and his antepost favourite M C Muldoon was left in at Monday’s confirmation stage. He remained a general 6-1 shot with Buzz at 7-1.
With the rain coming by the bucket load in the past week, Henderson has managed to gear up his jumps stars for the season ahead.
His exciting First Street heads the betting for Chepstow’s Grade 2 Unibet Persian War, live on ITV4 this Friday.
The trainer said: “I liked what he did last time and this is the obvious race for him now, there’s no point running him with a double penalty.
“We’ll see where we match up in terms of the rest of the pack and we’ll have plenty of nice ones to run at Chepstow and in the coming weeks as thankfully the heavens have finally opened.”
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