Villette – winner at 33/1
Villette has a history of winning at big prices and she continued that form with a 33/1 win at Kempton last night.
One of fourteen runners in the 1m3f handicap for 4yos and upwards rated 0-85, the Sixties Icon filly may have gone off at a big price but her victory was thoroughly justified. Always near the head of affairs, just behind the leaders, the Rob Hornby ridden filly travelled strongly throughout the race and she took it up inside the final furlong to win by a neck from Sporting Times.
Lightly raced, Villette has now won three of her nine career starts including two out of three at Kempton. Costing just 5,500 guineas at Newmarket in December 2016 the unraced filly soon made her mark with a 20/1 win by six lengths on her racecourse debut at Kempton as a 3yo in March 2017.
Consistency has not always been her strong suit but following two disappointing runs in the spring, Villette bounced back with a 50/1 win at Leicester in a 1m2f handicap in October of last year. Despite dead-heating with Entangling, she won the race outright in the Stewards’ Room.
The stable continues its good form month by month and yesterday’s success by Villette was the stable’s 23rd win of the year at a strike rate of 15% and its fourth victory in June. Half-way through the season last year, Harper Lodge Farm had secured 16 wins, so the yard is on schedule to beat last year’s total of 38 victories.
The stable’s best ever season numerically was in 2013 when the yard had 39 wins with 20 of those coming by the end of June, so it is also on target to achieve a record number of wins in a year.
