WESTERN Diva carried the colours made famous by 1988 Champion Hurdle winner Celtic Shot to a hard-fought victory at the Kingston Blount Racing Club meeting in Oxfordshire on Saturday.
Adlestrop trainer-rider Claire Hardwick sported the pink and grey silks of the Cheltenham Festival hero in the Members’ Conditions Race.
And, having taken up the running going up the hill for the last time, the nine-year-old mare stayed on best in the tacky ground to beat Will Fight by eight lengths.
Hardwick completed a riding double by taking the Bull And Butcher Ladies’ Open on Dabinett Moon, from Fran Marriott’s Chipping Norton stables.
And Christopher Marriott, who owns the mare with his wife, said: “It was really deep mud and carrying 12 stone over those bigger fences she couldn’t handle it. Only four runners finished.
“It was her 14th career success.”
Fred Hutsby, who trains at Wellesbourne in Warwickshire, enjoyed a welcome change of fortune when Mistercobar and Wilco gave him his first winners of the season.
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