POSTPONED was very good in winning the Juddmonte International at York on Wednesday. He was up against it too. Roger Varian’s stable was going through a bit of a lull going into the race, and Postponed himself was racing for the first time since he won the Coronation Cup in early June, having side-stepped the King George because of a respiratory infection. Also, going into the race, his record over 10 furlongs read 4323, while his record over 11 furlongs or further read 11311111. Now you can add a 1 to his record over 10.

There was an anomaly, however, in the manner in which Postponed drifted to his right through the final furlong, thereby impeding Mutakayyef as he tried to deliver his challenge. You can easily argue that Postponed was the best horse in the race, that it may have been that Mutakayyef just didn’t have the energy to go past him anyway, competing over the longest distance over which he had ever competed.