“THAT wasn’t supposed to happen,” quipped trainer Darren Weir moments after watching Two Hats, get up in the final stride to defeat the his $1.45 favourite Chequered Flag ridden by Johnny Allen in the Sunday’s A$125,000 J.J. Houlahan Hurdle.

A 10-length winner at his Warrnambool hurdling debut in July, Chequered Flag was the horse you wanted to be on first time past the post, but Two Hats, runner-up in the Grand National Hurdle a week earlier, was hard-fit and well-in on the set-weights scale, just a kilogram off the minimum.