Nicky Henderson to sharpen Divine Spear before Cheltenham

Divine Spear is set to have one more run before heading for the Cheltenham Festival, where the Close Brothers Novices' Handicap Chase remains his likely target.

The seven-year-old, trained by Nicky Henderson, has made a tremendous start to his career over fences, winning at Catterick and Ascot.

His latest success was most convincing and saw him take a prominent position in the ante-post market for Cheltenham.

Tom Palin, National Hunt manager for owners Middleham Park Racing, said: "The manner of his victory at Ascot was impressive and it was a bit of surprise he did that on only his second start over fences. It was lovely to see.

"He came out of the race fine. We gave him Christmas off and we're not in a frantic hurry to get him out again.

"We've just started building him up again and we'll probably try to find something for him at the end of January into early February.

"He's got to go once more if we're going to for the novices' handicap chase at Cheltenham. There's a Grade Two over two and a half miles at Haydock on January 20 we might look at.

"After his win at Ascot we are thinking of possibly setting our sights a bit higher. I don't think we'll be giving him an entry in the JLT, but there might be something further down the line, a Grade One at Aintree (the Manifesto Novices' Chase) we'll have half an eye on if he was to impress next time.

"It's a little up in the air what we do. If Aintree comes too early, he could be a Punchestown horse. We'll see."