NEVILLE Begg can strike at the first time of asking with Happy Go Lucky (Nap) in tonight's opening event on the Happy Valley grass.
The former top Sydney trainer has a smaller team compared to a couple of seasons ago but he has a number of quality individuals such as Winning Partners, Auto-Matching and Magic Joy (a big chance in the fourth event), that have thrived under his care.
Begg only took over the training of Happy Go Lucky at the beginning of February but the near-white gelding appears to be going better now than at any time since arriving here the season before last.
In that time he has failed to win but he has dropped from a mark of 72 in Class Two to tonight's rating of 55 in Class Three which enables him to take the voluntary demotion into Class Four.
He is burdened with an onerous 139 pounds but he has been found a seemingly uncompetitive event by Begg who is pretty astute at making use of the voluntary demotion scheme.
Happy Go Lucky was well there for a long way last time out before eventually weakening in the Class Three event won by Jharna at Sha Tin and it was after that run that he joined the Begg stable.
