HOT WELD landed his second big staying chase in successive weeks with a game victory in the Betfred Gold Cup at Sandown. Winner of the Scottish National last Saturday, Ferdy Murphy's charge made most of the running under Graham Lee to beat 9-4 favourite Reveillez by three lengths, with My Will six lengths back in third.

Hot Weld (6-1) was challenged by Zabenz when Philip Hobbs' runner made a mess of the final fence.

Richard Johnson managed to stay in the saddle but his chance had gone.

As expected, the eventual victor was first to break with Zabenz keeping him company, followed by top-weight My Will. Lee increased the tempo on Hot Weld when the field started out on their final circuit. This seemed to find Reveillez out as Tony McCoy's ride began putting in sloppy jumps.

Hot Weld's relentless gallop was taking its toll on his rivals and only Zabenz threatened to peg the eightyear-old back. However, a horrendous mistake at the last ended his bid.

The winner, who was 11lb out of the handicap, is the first horse to complete the Scottish National-Betfred Gold Cup double. VC Bet make Hot Weld 25-1 for next year's John Smith's Grand National, while BetDirect cut Murphy's charge from 33s to 20-1 for the Aintree feature.

"That was some training performance, " Lee said afterwards. "To get a Scottish Grand National winner out again after a week was superb. Full credit to the horse too. He wasn't having it early on but his guts got up him back up to the head of affairs - it's happy days."

Meanwhile Paul Nicholls and Ruby Walsh, havimg dominated the 2006-7 jumps campaign, teamed up to good effect to take the Betfredcasino Handicap Hurdle with Oslot. Walsh, fresh from being crowned champion jockey back home, settled the 9-1 shot just off the pace and drove him up to lead after the second-last flight.

The five-year-old made a mistake over the last but it failed to interrupt his winning stride and he went on to hold the front-running Chilling Place by a length and a quarter.

Nicholls said: "He ran well at Aintree where he was staying on strongly over two miles so I thought two-anda-half miles would suit him.

I thought he was handicapped to the hilt but he has gone and done it well. The string are on fire too, which obviously helps! He'll go novice chasing in the autumn now and we'll probably start him off over two and a half miles."