Queen's House takes the Dante

The Queen's Carlton House won the Group Two totesport Dante Stakes at York.

The Dante has emerged as one of the most significant of the Investec Derby Trials in recent years with Workforce, Authorized and Motivator all going on to score on the Epsom Downs.

Aidan O'Brien has won three of the last five renewals and saddled favourite Seville but he had to settle for second behind Carlton House in a time that was around three and a half seconds slower than Midday had run over the same course and distance half an hour earlier.

Sir Michael Stoute's colt was having his first run since impressively winning a Newbury maiden last October and showed his inexperience when getting a little worked up going into the stalls.

The son of Street Cry also raced a shade keenly during a slowly run race but he showed a tremendous attitude to quicken through a very narrow gap between the front-running Pisco Sour and Seville at around the furlong pole.

Carlton House and Seville came close together in the run to the line but it was Ryan Moore's mount that proved the strongest, prevailing by a length and a half to become Stoute's sixth Dante winner.

Moore was, however, less than impressed with the way that the race was run:

"He has done well there. "It was a horrible race as they didn't go any pace.

"It's shame, really, because nobody learned a great deal.

"He still showed a very good turn of foot. His work has been very good at home.

"We were pushed to the start - it was a messy, stupid race.

"It's only his third race and it's a nice race to win."

However, the winning trainer was a little happier with the performance and Stoute said: "I'm very pleased with him. We thought it could be a messy race, and it certainly turned out to be that.

"He learned a bit and I was delighted.

"He went through a tight opening and let's hope he can progress a bit more from that."

Stoute added: "In the early part of the race he was just a little keen, which is uncharacteristic.

"It was very satisfactory for a horse who had only raced twice beforehand.

"We had him ready for this as we couldn't find a race prior to the Dante.

"I would be surprised if the trip was a problem in the Derby."

O'Brien was satisfied with the performance of runner-up Seville. He said: "It was a very good race and a very good trial.

"We are delighted with our fellow, but the winner picked up better than we did.

"We can't complain, and the likelihood is he'll go to Epsom."

The bookmakers were certainly impressed with Sky Bet promoting the winner to 6-4 favouritism from 9-2 whilst they also pushed Seville out to 7-1 from 6s and the disappointing World Domination is now available at 20-1.