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By Frances O' Shea

Damien Lane will target next month’s Gosford $150,000 Provincial Championships Qualifier with Leogang after his dominant win the Les Tilley Racing Stables Class 2 Handicap (1000m) at Wyong on Tuesday.

Leogang (Blaike McDougall) coasts home at Wyong. Image by Steve Hart Photographics

Despite being slow to start, Blaike McDougall found the rails on the three-year-old Lonhro gelding, maintaining the lead until the straight where he drew away for a soft two and three-quarter length win.

Lane had considered he could head to the Championships with Leogang and the dominance of his victory left him with no doubt.

“It’s in three weeks and that works out perfect,” he said. “I think he should be fine over the 1200m. 1400m might be a different story but if he keeps improving who knows.

“He was a little bit tardy out today and he had to use him up but he didn’t over race and was happy to go at that speed. It was pretty soft in the end. He didn’t have to ask him to do a lot and he ran time.”

Lane said Leogang had been a bargain purchase and he’d like to be able to buy one like him every week.

“He’s very promising. He’s a pretty well-bred and a horse we wouldn’t have been able to afford to buy as a yearling. To be able to get something of his quality in the stable is good and he just keeps improving.”

McDougall said he felt if Leogang drew a barrier he would be hard to beat at Gosford: “He’s a nice little horse this who does everything right. He’s ticking all the boxes."

Leogang, starting at $2.05, beat the Kristin Buchanan-trained Invincible Gantsta ($4.40), with Tapavino ($15) from the Coyle stable, a long neck behind in third. The stable capped off the day in great fashion with a quinella in the Damien Lane Racing Stables Benchmark 70 (1350m).

Another Larga ($16) ran down stablemate Cervinia ($21) in the final stages of the race, with favourite Global Rocket ($4.20) third. Lane said he had been reasonably confident with the chances of both runners.

View the full results with race replays for Wyong here