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College Chapel ($1.75 favourite, Bernie Hewitt) found the blazing from his juvenile years to thrash the field in Wednesday night's TAB Western Region Championships Consolation A (2,260 metres) at Bathurst Paceway.
The former Bathurst Gold Crown winner narrowly missed a place in the Western Region series' Group 1 final but he hit the target in the consolation event by beating the next closest runner, Firestorm Red ($5.50, Steve Turnbull), by over 13 metres.
Hewitt said the signs were there over his two unsuccessful heat runs, and the inside draw helped to bring the best out of College Chapel.
"His couple of runs before in the two heats weren't too bad but the draw sort of got him. Both times he had to go back and try to get himself in the race," he said.
"I was happy with the form coming into it. This time he got the good draw and was able to take advantage of it.
"He had a number of trials but having those two race starts really had him peaking right for that race. It was a pity he missed out on the final but at least he's picked up that consolation money."
The warning signs for the field arrived with 500 metres to go.
That was when space started to appear between College Chapel and Firestorm Red, who was racing on the leader's back.
The space became three metres, five metres, then by the time the field crossed the 200m mark it had gone up to double figures.
By that stage the rest of the field were racing for the runner-up spot.
Wednesday's win marked almost a year to the day, on May 24 2019, when College Chapel last won - although he has been lightly raced over the past season in order to keep his grade below the required level for the series.
The current regionalisation situation means that trend of light racing might continue for College Chapel.
With Menangle still out of the picture it's unlikely Hewitt will extend his preparation much longer.
Still, Wednesday's win could be a sign that College Chapel is on the rise and that he could have more feature races in him over the coming season.
Hewitt said whether he reaches the highs of his star two-year-old season is difficult to say.
"He won the Sapling Stakes in smashing style. He ran from the outside of the gate down in Sydney and came across to do the work outside of the leader and he was so dominant in that race. His Gold Crown win was also great," he said.
"It's hard to know whether he's back to that form. He's probably not too far off the mark. Obviously with a bit of age comes more competition so it will be interesting to see which way he heads.
"We still may give him a run or two but if we can't go to Menangle I may have to back off him for a while."