Red-hot Ryan Moore delivers superb ride on Cleveland to win Chester Cup

Ryan Moore (left) wins the Chester Cup on Cleveland

Edward Whitaker (racingpost.com/photos)

Friday: Chester Cup, Chester

A phenomenal week for Aidan O’Brien and Ryan Moore continued as the pair combined with Cleveland to land the feature Chester Cup at 6-1.

This contest had previously eluded O’Brien but given a brave ride on the rail by Moore, Cleveland was angled out to pip Coltrane and notch his trainer’s first win in the race.

The son of Camelot was going into unknown territory stamina wise having finished fifth in a 1m2f Listed race on his last start but always looked to have the eventual runner-up in his sight and found plenty when asked to put the race to bed.

‘An absolutely brilliant ride’

O’Brien said: “Everybody at home has done a great job to get him back and I thought Ryan [Moore] gave him an absolutely brilliant ride.

“We have always liked him and we always knew he was a very classy horse. He won his maiden late in the year at two and he didn’t run at all at three, but we all thought that was a lovely run at Naas on his comeback and we were delighted with him.

“We weren’t really sure how far he was going to stay so it was great to see him finish out his race the way he did and Ryan was very good on him.”

tote+ Chester Cup Handicap: full result and race replay

Straight after the race the four-year-old was slashed into 12-1 (from 66-1) for the Ascot Gold Cup and the trainer seems to be happy with that suggestion now his staying credentials have been proven.

“Obviously he has plenty of class,” he added. “Now we know he stays, Ascot will be the plan for him.

“He’s in the big races there [Gold Cup and Hardwicke] and we’ll see how he comes out of Chester before deciding which way we’ll go.”

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FIRST PUBLISHED 3:30PM, MAY 6 2022