City of Troy clinches victory in the Coral-Eclipse with a solid performance.
City Of Troy ridden by Ryan Moore at Epsom
City Of Troy put in the work to take the win in the Coral-Eclipse at Sandown.
The Derby winner, who bounced back at Epsom having failed to land a blow in the 2000 Guineas, was the 1-4 favourite under Ryan Moore.
For trainer Aidan O’Brien he stalked along in the slipstream of stablemate Hans Andersen, but when asked to quicken he did not produce the turn of foot perhaps expected.
He still took up the lead, however, and was able to hold off a late challenge from 11-1 shot Al Riffa to triumph by a length.
Elsewhere, John and Thady Gosden took home the Coral Distaff at Sandown, but it was with 25-1 outsider Spiritual rather than 9-4 favourite Regal Jubilee.
Second amongst useful company at York in May, the George Strawbridge-owned daughter of Invincible Spirit was bounced out the stalls and immediately sent to the front in the hands of Richard Kingscote.
She faced a strong challenge up the home straight as Regal Jubilee, Royal Ascot scorer Soprano and Ralph Beckett’s Indelible all took aim at the front-running filly.
However, she never backed down and responded with real enthusiasm to her rider’s urgings, beating off the opposition and coming home a length and a quarter ahead of Indelible.
Soprano settled for third, while Regal Jubilee was unplaced in fourth as her stablemate took home the spoils.
Kingscote said: “Her team have obviously done a lot of work to settle her and she has form on slow ground and it all worked out well on the day.
“She kept responding and it is very windy up the straight which may have stopped the others making too much ground on us. But as I say everything went really nicely for her and it was a good result.
“She’s obviously learning and is still lightly raced. She’s going the right way so there is no reason to think that she can’t come on for today.
“It’s very nice to ride decent horses for decent people and hopefully I will be lucky enough to get
