Morris hits milestone

Luke Morris rode his 1,500th career winner when producing a tremendous effort to land the Archerfield Cup on Timoshenko at Musselburgh yesterday.

The 11-4 second favourite, who was never travelling during the £30,000 two-mile contest, eventually responded to his jockey’s urgings and saw off Austrian School by a neck.

Sir Mark Prescott’s Newmarket raider was winning his fifth race from as many starts in 2018 and Morris said: “All credit to Sir Mark as not many horses win five handicaps in a year. This was a big step up in class for him and it wasn’t the ideal track for him either. I rode him four times last season and I’d have said you’d be lucky to win one race with him!”

Paul Hanagan was in fine form and won on his first four mounts to complete a 193-1 accumulator.

The former champion rode Call Him Al and Crocket to victory for Richard Fahey and also scored on Keith Dalgleishtrained Diamonique and Rebeccamenzies’trautmann.

On his first winner Call Him Al, who carried top-weight in the nursery, Hanagan said: “I thought he was very tough and game. He kept finding for me and saw the trip out well.”

Meanwhile, glamour and racing collide at Ayr this evening with QTS Ladies Night. The seven-race card kicks off with the course’s only race of the season that is confined to lady professional and amateur riders – the QTS Women In Engineering Lady Riders’ Handicap.

Course winner Coviglia, trained by Jacqueline Coward and ridden by Joanna Mason, contests this and comes up against a few Irish raiders including Texas Radio from the John James Feane yard. The QTS In The Community EBF Novice Stakes has eight runners going to post and the only previous winner is Fuente, trained by Dalgleish and ridden by Phillip Makin, who has to give weight all round.

The feature race of the night is the QTS Ladies’ Night Grand Spectacularhandicapoverthe minimum trip of five furlongs and recent course winner Oriental Lilly, trained by Jim Goldie and ridden by Jamie Gormley, looks interesting as does Iain Jardine’s She’s Pukka, the mount of Graham Lee.