Turner signs off with a 2nd as Litigant wins Hayley Turner's chance to sign off with a big-race winner was quashed when her mount Buonarroti was beaten by Litigant in the Betfred November Handicap at Doncaster. Joe Tuite's charge was a shock winner of the Ebor at York in August but he was not unfancied here and was backed on course from 16/1 down to 10/1 as he dropped back to 12 furlongs on Town Moor. It looked like being a dream result for Turner as she hit the front aboard the Declan Carroll-trained Buonarotti on her final ride before retirement. However, Litigant was always coasting in behind and was brought through the pack by George Baker to throw down his challenge two furlongs from the finish. Turner gave her best aboard the runner-up but despite the burden of top-weight, Litigant was far too good, scoring by an eased-down four and a half lengths. Esteaming claimed third, beaten two and a half lengths, with Mistiroc fourth after steering a wide route around the outside of the course in the early stages. "I've been saying it for some time but he's quite a good horse," said Baker, who is himself also giving up riding now, albeit only for a few weeks in order to get married. "If you'd seen him work at Salisbury on bottomless ground earlier in the year you wouldn't have been worried about him here on this surface and I suppose with hindsight he was a bit of a good thing. It takes some doing to win one of these big handicaps off a mark of 106 but he's quite something." Tuite understandably was left believing that Litigant's effort represented Pattern-class form and was left looking forward to next year with his charge now. He said: "There's a lot of satisfaction and a bit of relief as well. "It wasn't the plan originally to be in the November Handicap but when we ran at Ascot last time, things just didn't go to plan at all so we said we would come and give it a go. I think he proved today what a good horse he really is. "We've always said he's a Group horse and I think that was a Group Two or Three performance today. George couldn't believe how well he was going when he pulled him out, he said he just kept coming. He said he could have been clever, but there was no point in that ground. "We've got lucky. We've got him right for the Ebor and since the Ebor, there have been no hurdles. We went to France to run on Arc day and the ground was too fast and it was hard to take him out as we were all there and keyed up to run. "I said if we ran the horse, we would wreck him and there's big days in him for us yet, so we had to be patient. Then we went to Ascot for Champions Day, we got trapped out wide and it never happened. But today it's come good."
