On a delightful balmy evening, 42 runners filled all bar one race to each-way betting, but close finishes were missing among some authoritative winners. It was not a day when the judge was put under duress.

The two chases delivered big margin winners in You Decide and Duke of Luckley.

In the first of these, four declarations were headed by long odds-on favourite Beorma, from champion trainer Dan Skelton's nearby yard. Riding high on the back of a winning sequence of 7 consecutive wins that started at the end of May, connections clearly anticipated the mare's rise up the rankings to continue. However, a mistake at the second fence put paid to her appetite for the rest of the race and Harry Skelton pulled up the mare at the seventh.

It was left to Duke of Luckley and young Freddie Keighley riding for his father to secure the Condicote stable's fourth winner of the current campaign, and Duke of Luckley's 8th career success, the winning margin over In This World a distant 26l among the two finishers.

Beorma however, retains an entry at Newton Abbot later in the week.

An hour later into the evening, You Decide was equally dismissive of his rivals in the 2m5f handicap, named after Stratford's hardworking groundstaff, who have toiled all hours to deliver good racing ground.

You Decide, Perscatorius and Whatoutitscookie had it between them turning on, but Ben Jones had only to shake up You Decide to put the issue beyond doubt. The topweight could readily have asserted a bigger margin than the 9 1/2l recorded by the judge.

The Skelton camp, which has been setting a blistering pace in their pursuit of Martin Pipe's season tally of 240 winners, sent three runners to the meeting. Whilst Beorma failed to score, the scoresheet moved along to 72 with the 8 1/2l success of Delgany Second Now in the limited handicap hurdle. Having not shown much over 3 previous races all at the minimum trip, this extra half mile seemed to find favour.

The opening contest, a mares maiden, also saw a decisive winner in Guts And Glory, a 7l winner for Clive Boultbee-Brooks and Stan Sheppard. She had her rivals well spread out, the last of six finishers a full 50l behind at the line, but an ante-post punt on the mares novice hurdle at next March's Festival is premature as yet.

A sequence of 3 winning favourites set up the second half of the evening, where winners for Nick Schofield and Fergal O'Brien sandwiched the display by You Decide.

11/8 priced Mi Sueno was always travelling strongly in the Allsopps Love Stratford Handicap Hurdle over 2m 2f. Although the gelding's jumping was not fluent over the final pair of hurdles, Harry Reed had the race in safe keeping once the jumping was over to score by 4l for team Schofield, which has made a promising start to Nick's fledgling training career.

No jumping issues in the concluding bumper, but drama of another kind beforehand. The Twiston-Davies runner Company Charge collapsed in the paddock preliminaries and was withdrawn after a full recovery which left connections scratching their heads, and officials briefly with furrowed brows. Happily all was well.

It was left to Fern O'Brien to produce Goliath Power to come from the rear through his field to win handsomely by 6l on debut. There'll doubtless be more to come from this one.