Cut A Dash does just that at York

Richard Hannon kicked off the new season at York by winning the British Stallion Studs EBF Novice Stakes with Cut A Dash.

From a family Hannon knows well, he is now debating whether to send the Starspangledbanner colt to Royal Ascot.

Sent off an 11-4 chance, Sean Levey made his challenge furthest away from the stands and he quickened up impressively to beat Karl Burke’s Varzi by almost three lengths.

The winner was given a 14-1 quote for the Coventry Stakes by Unibet.

Hannon said: “We trained his mare, Promising, and he’s very nice for Prince Faisal (owner). He has always been a nice colt, I was going to go to Newbury but this race looked like it had cut up compared to there.

“He was a little bit (fractious) and he is not like this at home but he has seen an awful lot today. Hopefully he has had a nice experience and will go home and have something to eat and think that if that’s the worst thing to happen to him, then he will be alright. He was a little bit green in the paddock beforehand and he was a little bit in the race.

“I’d love to think we are going somewhere like Ascot, hopefully he’ll grow up a lot from this, he will need to if we are to do that. He’s passed the first test very well, all the nice races at Ascot (Norfolk and Coventry) are very possible. He won’t run before, I like to leave them in the promised land between.

“It’s great for Prince Faisal, he is a homebred and the dam was a lovely filly.”