Aqaleem breeze thrills Tregoning

Marcus Tregoning has maintained the same tradition as with last year’s Vodafone Derby winner Sir Percy by taking Aqaleem for a spin at Lingfield in preparation for the big race.

A combination of bad weather in Lambourn and a little bit of fine tuning saw Tregoning bring his colt to the Surrey track on Tuesday – four days ahead of his assignment a few miles away at Epsom.

Aqaleem, who is as low as 8-1 second favourite for the Classic behind Authorized, has been to Lingfield before.

The son of Sinndar entered the Derby reckoning after an impressive victory in the Group Three trial race a fortnight ago and was again partnered by Richard Hills in his exercise.

“Richard met me at Lingfield this morning and we worked Aqaleem over a mile,” explained Tregoning.

“Richard was very satisfied and the thinking behind it was really that I wanted to see him come down a hill yet again.

“We have had a lot of rain at home and the gallops are so soft they are really unsuitable to work him on.

“We worked him on the Polytrack and it all went terribly well. It is exactly what we did with Sir Percy a year ago.

“Aqaleem is very fit and that was his last proper piece of work.

“We will just keep him cantering until the big race.”