A recent trial has prompted trainer Gavin Bedggood to make a tactical gear change with stable addition Regal Lion, who is set to have his first run for the yard this Saturday at Mornington.

Formerly trained by Annabel and Rob Archibald, Regal Lion lines up in the Enchanted Adventure Handicap (2000m), looking to bounce back from his last-start finish toward the rear in the Listed Canberra Cup back in March.

Following an encouraging second in a 1500m trial at Cranbourne on the Caulfield Heath track last week, Bedggood and jockey Beau Mertens agreed to swap out the blinkers for visors in an effort to sharpen the gelding’s focus on race day.

“He arrived to me in good order,” Bedggood said.

“He’s a sound horse and we gave him a trial at Caulfield last Thursday.

“He hasn’t been a winner for a long time, so I wanted to see if we could give him a bit of a victory.

“He went around them pretty easily and he looked like he was going to put them away, but he had a bit of a wait.

“Watching on and then listening to Beau’s feedback, we’ll replace blinkers with visors and hopefully that can be the trick with him.”

Since arriving at Bedggood’s Cranbourne base, Regal Lion has experienced a shift in routine, with the stable implementing a new training strategy aimed at keeping the gelding fresh and enthusiastic.

“We’ve been doing a bit of jumping with him,” Bedggood said.

“He arrived a very fit horse, so we haven’t had to do much with him in between times, it’s more so just keeping him happy.

“Our environment at Cranbourne is we have yards, we’ve got the sandhills, and that seems to have worked well for him, so I would like to think he would get the chance to run well and the best of him would see him competitive for sure.”