Yellow Car keeps River Don after 20-minute inquiry

Connections of Yellow Car had a nervous wait to earn jockey Nick Slatter the biggest win of his career in the Pertemps Network River Don Novices’ Hurdle at .

The 10-1 shot faced a 20 minute wait before discovering he had kept the race after beating Moon River by a neck.

After a clumsy jump over the last obstacle Moon River (11-4) and Tom Bellamy drifted across the track and Yellow Car went with him to the far rail.

The Graeme McPherson and David Killahena-trained Yellow Car always seemed to hold the advantage and kept his nose in front right to the line.

Slatter said: “He just kept sticking his neck out the whole way. He’s just really hardy. Tom’s horse has drifted away from mine and I’ve just followed him across. I don’t think there will be anything to change.

“I’ve not bumped him at all. I’ve just followed him across. Tom went across after the last and this horse loves a battle and I’ve just drifted across.”

McPherson was always confident that the places would remain unaltered and he would keep the Grade Two event.

He said: “I know they drifted across the track – it looked like Tom drifted across and our one followed him across.

“I don’t think Tom’s one ever got his head in front. Certainly from the last one it always looked like we were a head up, a neck up.”

Killahena said: “I’ll be totally honest with you. He came here today off the back of the last run at Cheltenham and he had a right chance and he’s gone and done the job.

“The thing with this lad is he is always saving, saving, saving. He never overloads himself.

“Even from the second last there you still see there was plenty left in the tank.”

Slatter was handed a two-day suspension by the stewards for careless riding.

Joint-trainer Mat Nicholls rued the mistake at the last from Moon Rocket, which he believes was the difference between victory and defeat.

“He’s run a blinder. If he’d jumped the last we wouldn’t have had to go through 10 minutes of torment, would we!

“It was just a bit of greenness. He was off the bridle going down to the last and he’s never really been racing before so he was having a look around.

“It’s unfortunate, we’ve been carried a long way across the track but there’s been no contact and I’m sure it’s a fair result.

“He travelled like a classy horse but he perhaps didn’t find as much as looked likely, I thought at the second-last he’d go away and win.

“He’s a nice horse to go forward with. Being honest, he’s not a Cheltenham horse but Aintree and Cheltenham are quite close together this year so we could probably have a look at Aintree.”