​Aye Right a runner-up for Borders racehorse trainers Harriet Graham and Gary Rutherford at Warwick

​Borders-trained Aye Right missed out on the Unibet Veterans’ Handicap Chase’s £38,580 top prize at Warwick Racecourse on Saturday by almost three lengths despite leading for much of the way.
By Darin Hutson
Published 15th Jan 2024, 11:37 BST
Updated 15th Jan 2024, 11:37 BST
Camptown racehorse trainer Harriet Graham with Aye Right (Photo: Bill McBurnie)Camptown racehorse trainer Harriet Graham with Aye Right (Photo: Bill McBurnie)
Camptown racehorse trainer Harriet Graham with Aye Right (Photo: Bill McBurnie)

​Rescheduled from the prior Saturday’s cancelled meeting at Sandown Park in Surrey, that £75,000 chase was won by Sam Brown, a 12-year-old bay gelding ridden by Jonathan Burke for Dorset trainer Anthony Honeyball.

Camptown training partnership Harriet Graham and Gary Rutherford’s Aye Right, with Dylan Johnston in the saddle, had been in front from the eighth to the last fence and in line for his first win since November 2021 but was pipped to the post at the end of the three-mile course, earning prize money of £17,738.

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Graham was pleased by the performance put in by the 11-year-old bay gelding, owned by Melrose’s Geoff and Elspeth Adam, but frustrated to see him having to settle for his second runner-up spot in his last three outings.

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“I’m dead proud of the horse but it is frustrating to be second again,” she said.

“Look at his record in these veterans’ chases – he’s been second, third, second.

“You can’t take it away from the horse and we’ll take him home and find him something nice for the spring.

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“We were on the verge of going hunter-chasing with him, which is level weights, but he’s probably too good for that still.”

Saturday’s race was Aye Right’s first since a third-place finish at the same track, with Borders jockey Ryan Mania riding, in November.

The latest of his eight wins to date was at Newcastle in November 2021, with Jedburgh’s Callum Bewley as jockey, following another first-place finish there in 2020.

His other previous wins were at Ayr twice and Kelso in 2019, at Kelso at the double in 2018 and at Carlisle in 2017.

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Honeyball added: “We have been quite lucky really as he had a bit of an issue and we would have been struggling to get him to Sandown last week.

“We thought we had him in good order in general and this is fantastic.

“I knew halfway through that in this sort of race, it was just about giving him a chance to stay in there, and his jumping was just good enough today. It kept him in it.

“It’s great to get him here in one piece and then go on to win.”

See also …

https://www.thesouthernreporter.co.uk/sport/other-sport/selkirk-trainer-stuart-coltherd-notches-up-win-with-251-outsider-silver-vision-at-kelso-4478142

Related topics:Gary RutherfordWarwickBorders