Bluey digs deep to land Market Rasen feature by a neck

Bluey kept the kind of company Emma Lavelle values most at Market Rasen, where a mare that stays, jumps and refuses to fold proved again why such horses are “worth their weight in gold.” In the Book Summer Plate Ladies Day Today Mares’ Novices’ Handicap Chase, the 5-2 favourite was headed two fences from home, but she found enough to fight back and beat Molto Bene by a neck over 2m5f89yds.

The result was more than a narrow verdict. Bluey made much of the running in the Class 1 Premier Handicap and, when another challenger briefly went in front late on, Harry Cobden had to ask for more. She answered in the manner Lavelle has come to expect, re-engaging after the pressure and digging deep all the way to the line. The winner’s purse of £28,475 underlined the value of the performance.

It was Bluey’s third chase victory of the season, adding another significant prize to the winter success she took at Windsor’s Winter Millions meeting in January. The Market Rasen win also sharpened the case that this is no one-pace front-runner. She had already shown her ceiling by finishing second in the Listed BetMGM Agatha Christie Mares’ Novices’ Chase at Wincanton on 14 February, over 1m7f149y, under Brendan Powell. Stepping back up in trip and back into a more demanding race shape, she still produced a finish that separated her from the rest.

That progression fits the profile Lavelle has been building since Bluey won on her chasing debut at Wincanton in November 2025, when the trainer said she felt jumping fences would be the making of her. Bluey is now a seven-year-old mare, foaled on 18 March 2019, by Affinisea out of Hannah Maud, and owned by J R Lavelle and David Cottam. Her record stood at six wins from 13 career starts after Market Rasen, with a recent sequence that has repeatedly shown prominent tactics and a willingness to keep galloping.

Lavelle said after the race that Bluey is always fighting, needs to do things her own way and was a great way to end her season. She also described the mare as strong in herself and difficult on the gallops, traits that help explain why the same raw toughness keeps surfacing when the pressure rises. The bigger question now is whether that staying grit can carry her back onto turf and into even better mares’ races next time out.