It might not have been pretty but Solo Saxophone has made history as the first runner and first winner over jumps for his sire, former champion racehorse Frankel.
Formerly trained by Dermot Weld, the three-year-old colt is now in the care of Dan Skelton who sent him out at Catterick on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT).
Everything was going smoothly for the 6-4 favourite until the fifth-last, when he made a bad blunder. Solo Saxophone then lost even more ground at the next flight when a horse jumped across him.
At that point he could be backed at nearly 100-1 on the exchanges but jockey Harry Skelton made his mind up for him and decided to see what he had left.
Quite impressively, he kept on picking up and it looked inevitable after the last that he would catch Outcrop, who went down by four lengths.
“It didn’t look likely down the back straight, but he got a bit of a fright,” Skelton said.
“This is a sharp track and we were on the back-foot after that.
“He showed a decent amount of ability on the Flat but he’d worn headgear, which we left off.
“To win first time over hurdles is all you can ask and I think he’ll be better in a bigger field.
“One thing he’s shown there is that’s he’s definitely got an engine.”
