![Trainer Eric Musgrove (left) at the 2023 Warrnambool May Racing Carnival. Picture by Sean McKenna Trainer Eric Musgrove (left) at the 2023 Warrnambool May Racing Carnival. Picture by Sean McKenna](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/justine.mc%40fairfaxmedia.com.au/f5b596a3-938d-43f3-8bcb-9f793993fabb.jpg/r0_0_6000_4000_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
MORE than 50 horses will take part in Warrnambool's first jumps trials for 2024 on Thursday, February 22.
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Leading jumps trainers Eric Musgrove, Symon Wilde, Ciaron Maher, Aaron Purcell plus Gay Waterhouse and Adrian Bott have runners in the hurdle and steeple trials.
Musgrove saddles up Valley Forge, Resolutions, Calvi, Oz Legend, Gambu and Pick Me in hurdles while Fort Charles lines up in a steeplechase trial.
He said there was plenty of interest from owners and trainers leading into the new jumps season.
"It looks like being a big year for jumps racing," Musgrove told The Standard.
"We've got better-quality horses getting ready for this jumps season. There's a few international horses who were going to run in the last couple of Melbourne Cup (features) and other feature flat staying races that never measured up and now there going down the jumps path.
"It's going to be really exciting watching how these horses develop as jumpers."
Hibernian Prince won the 2001 and 2002 Warrnambool Grand Annual Steeplechase for the master jumps trainer and he's earmarked Fort Charles at the 2024 jumps feature.
"I'm still working through our jumps horses for the Warrnambool May Carnival," Musgrove said.
"Fort Charles could be our Annual runner but we may unearth another one or two in the lead up to the Annual."
Warrnambool Racing Club track and facilities manager Dermott O'Connor said more than 60 millimetres of irrigation had been put on the course in the past week to prepare for the jumps trials.
"The dry weather conditions have forced us to put plenty of water on the track and in the paddocks in the last week," O'Connor said.
"We're hoping to have the track in the soft range for the jumpers."
Meanwhile, the meeting listed for Warrnambool next Thursday has been transferred to Ararat as the new judges' tower at Warrnambool is not finished.