Sprinter Sacre easily beats Peddlers in Kempton

Sprinter Sacre was a brilliant winner of the Grade 2 williamhill.com Novices' Chase at Kempton this afternoon.

Peddlers Cross set out to make all the running but made an uncharacteristic mistake at the first fence handed the advantage to his sole serious market rival.

From that moment the 11-10 winner was never headed, clever when in close and occasionly breathtaking over his fences.

Peddlers Cross tried to close him down turning for home but Barry Geraghty never had to get serious with the Nicky Henderson-trained winner who went clear between the last two.

At the line 16 lengths separated the pair, both of who were heavily eased.

Sky Bet cut the winner to 2-1 favourite for the Arkle at Cheltenham with Peddlers Cross out to 6-1. Stan James are also 2-1 about the winner.

Geraghty said: "I adore this horse. That was top class.

"He was all wrong at the last but was very clever at it. He jumped from fence to fence and is a horse that gets your blood up. We always knew he was going to make a smashing chaser.

"For a big horse, he is very clever. He shows plenty of respect for his fences and is not running like a headless chicken.

"He's got the right combination of pace and respect for his fences. He's one of the best I've ever sat on - he is frighteningly good."

Henderson added: "We've jumped the first and he (Peddlers Cross) hasn't. We've gone from Plan A to Plan B - Barry said that's about as good as it gets."

McCain said: "At first I was devastated but I've spoken to Jason and he's made me feel a huge amount better.

"He's happy, he said he's learned plenty. He gave the first a good old rub and that gave him a fright and he took a while to warm up after that.

"I think we have to seriously consider stepping up in trip. He won over two-five as a novice at Cheltenham and two miles around here on this day was sharp enough.

"He's a neat and clever jumper but he's not exuberant and it might be that we need to step up and we've always thought we may need to, we only dropped back to two because of the Champion Hurdle.

"We always thought we'd have this season over two with a view to stepping up to longer distances next season but we may have to do that sooner. I'll have a good talk with Tim (Leslie, owner).

"Jason was happy, no excuses, the winner is a very good two-mile chaser - over this trip he might be very special. We bought him to make a chaser and if we have to go over further so be it."