Talking Horses: Saffie Osborne lifts Chester Cup in rookie season

S affie Osborne, who is in her first season as a fully-fledged professional having ridden out her claim in November, landed the most valuable success of her career at Chester on Friday as Metier stayed on strongly from the top of the straight to beat Zoffee by a neck in the Tote Chester Cup.

Harry Fry’s gelding had a disappointing time over hurdles over the winter, when he was pulled up on both his starts, but bounced back to the form that had seen horse and rider take last season’s November Handicap at Doncaster off an 8lb lower mark. The first prize of £76,000 was just over twice as much as Metier won on Town Moor six months ago.

“It didn’t really go right through the race, I was too far back and he was all guts,” Osborne said.

“I was saying what a tough horse he is, but he’s also extremely talented and still fairly unexposed at this trip on the Flat. You’d like to think there’s more left in the tank.

“He’s just got a lot of ability and for a big horse he’s very well balanced to go round a track like this. I was having to make up ground on a part of a track that I didn’t really want to have to, but he was making it feel very easy and I didn’t want to check his momentum.”

Earlier on the card, the odds-on favourite, Point Lonsdale, had to work hard to gain a first Group Two success since August 2021 in the Huxley Stakes, holding the late challenge of Mujtaba by a neck having been strongly ridden for much of the way by Ryan Moore.

Aidan O’Brien’s colt was a leading juvenile two seasons ago but made only one start at three, when he finished well down the field in the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket after being sent off at 11-2.

“It wasn’t very pretty, was it?,” Moore conceded afterwards. “He’s a real galloper and he probably