Sanders Stars On Spectait

Seb Sanders made it three wins at Glorious Goodwood this week when he gave Spectait a brilliant ride in the £150,000 totesport Mile.

His cause was not helped when Sir Mark Prescott's well-backed 9-2 chance missed the beat at the start.

However, Sanders is riding at the top of his game and he soon had the four-year-old racing in mid-division in the 17-runner contest.

Spectait made headway from three furlongs out to throw down a challenge to the front-running 7-2 favourite Dunelight.

But he briefly hung fire and it was not until well inside the final furlong that the winner got on top to score by half a length in a new course record time of 1 minute 35.61 seconds.

Prince Of Thebes (66-1) stuck on well for third a length away, with Sir Gerard (13-2) running a big race from stall one another one and three-quarters away in fourth.

Sanders said: 'He's always promised to be a good horse.

'But to be honest we've probably been a little bit disappointed with him although he has never gone down without putting in a good performance, so it was really pleasing to go and win nice prize like this.

'It went quite smoothly for us considering he was so slow out of the gate.

'Normally we ride him quite quiet but with him being drawn quite well in 16 I tried to get him out a bit quicker but he just flopped out again and for all my kicking and pushing it took time for him to get into his stride.

'I recovered and got a very good position and he travelled so well I was always in control of what was happening in front of me.

'It was just a case of wondering what might come from behind.

'I was fighting him trying to keep him straight and when I stopped fighting him and let him drift he found another length.'

Spectait was bred by New Zealand's eventing Olympic gold medalist Blyth Tait, who was on hand to witness the success.

He said: 'I bought the mare (Shanghai Girl) and shipped her down to New Zealand and then Edward Belcher (Spectait's owner) bought her foal.

'I arrived here on Thursday and it was just luck this horse was running.'

Trainer Clive Cox was delighted with runner-up Dunelight's performance and said: 'I can't be disappointed with that ? in fact I'm over the moon but I suspect his days in handicaps are numbered.

'He was off a 3lb penalty and will be 9lb higher in the future ? I think we will be looking at Listed options for him.'

Despite his starting price, Prince Of Thebes's performance did not come as a surprise to connections.

Trainer Jon Akehurst said: 'I did have a little fancy for him and when he was a pain to saddle up I knew he was well.

'He's in the Shergar Mile next Saturday but that will come too soon and it could be that we look for a race abroad with him.'

(C) PA Sport