A former polo groom who begged her boss to allow her to train a point-to-pointer paid him back in spades when saddling Top Wood to win today's Randox Health Foxhunters' Chase in his colours.g

 

The boss in question, Johnny Weatherby, chairman of racing administrators Weatherbys, and The Queen's representative at Ascot, was at Aintree to witness his Top Wood, trained by Kelly Morgan and ridden by Tabitha Worsley, land the £45,000 race.

 

Top Wood (14/1) who has been placed in the two most recent runnings of the St James's Place Foxhunter Chase at Cheltenham, brought his stamina to bear when rallying after the Elbow to regain the lead from runner-up Burning Ambition (11/2) and win by two lengths. A further 11 lengths back in third was Road To Riches (20/1).

 

Morgan, who is based at a yard owned by Weatherby near Oakham in Rutland, is the sister of another licensed trainer, Laura. Their brother, Tommy, is a talented trainer of pointers, while their father, Kevin, also trained.

 

The winning trainer had barely any sleep last night after it was discovered Top Wood suffered a stone bruise yesterday - her night-time vigil involved bathing his foot in buckets of ice.

 

She said of Top Wood: "People have called him a monkey in the past, but he's not. He's incredibly brave and really stuck his neck out today. I could barely watch the finish. He jumped the first two and got into a bit of a rhythm - he's the type of horse who you know early in a race how he's going, and if he's jumping and travelling he will be hard to beat.

 

"Straight after Cheltenham we decided to come here. He's 12 now so what did we have to lose? When it started raining today everyone was running from it, but I was virtually dancing in it. He loves the soft ground and the more rain that fell, the more I felt he could go well.

 

"We got to know Tabitha two years ago when she took a spare ride for us on Decade Player at High Easter and won on him. I'd looked her up and thought she looked like a good rider and our association has grown from there. Today I just said 'get a good start, let him pop away and see if he's enjoying it'.

 

"He's such a strong traveller, but everybody seemed to think we were mad to drop him down in trip. I never had that in mind and pointed out that he seems to get everything off the bridle at Cheltenham. He travels that strongly and he's not a slow horse - the only question was whether he would take to the fences. The other horse [Burning Ambition] came to him, but I knew our horse would be as brave as a lion and wouldn't go down without a fight.

 

"I started at Johnny's seven years ago as a part-time polo groom. At that time Johnny had a few pointers with a guy just up the road and one day I said to him, 'Can I train a couple - why can't I have a couple at home?'. He laughed and put it off for a year, then one day he said, 'You can train and ride old Valance, and I'll have a bit of fun with that,' and it went from there. He won first time out with me on board - that was about five years ago.

 

"We have just five horses in, all owned by Johnny. I took out a full licence in October."

 

Weatherby said: "It's unbelievable - that was a fantastic training performance by Kelly, and Tabitha gave him a great ride."

 

 

Tabitha Worsley enjoyed a dream first ride over the Grand National fences when partnering last month's Cheltenham Festival third Top Wood (14/1) to success in the prestigious Randox Health Foxhunters' Chase less than 18 months after breaking her back in a fall in a handicap hurdle at Ludlow.

 

Worsley, who is 24 and has had 26 winners in point-to-points and 14 now under Rules since cutting her teeth on the pony racing circuit, still has rods in her back and shoulder but they are clearly no hindrance and her rallying two-length win on the Kelly Morgan-trained winner came only 24 hours after she had won a handicap hurdle at Market Rasen for the trainer's sister Laura Morgan.

 

She said: "I got back from breaking my back about three months after the Ludlow fall and I was due to ride in a handicap chase here on National day last year but then broke my collar bone about a week before. So last year wasn't my year, but this year certainly is."

 

Worsley, who is the fifth female rider to win the Foxhunters' and walked the course in the morning with former jockey Brian Harding, added: "The rods will probably stay in forever, but they don't stop me. They were always quite upbeat after my injury, and although they said it would be six months I worked towards three months.

 

"It's unbelievable to win here, and so good to reward them (the Morgan sisters and owner Johnny Weatherby) for sticking by me through all my injuries. To reward them on a stage like this is really special."

 

Of Top Wood, she said: "He gave me a dream ride, and although Burning Ambition went past me quite quickly I could feel him start to fight again, then once he got rolling I was always confident he would get back to him.

 

"He's a little legend. He's not very big but he has a lot of heart. He's a game little horse and he's a nippy little horse. You don't get too many feelings like that. There's only the Cheltenham race that's bigger (for an amateur)."