Hugo Palmer is set to line up defending hero Zoffee in next month’s Ladbrokes Chester Cup, which takes place on Friday 9th May. The gelding, who is now nine, won the £170,000 race last year for local trainer Palmer, who is based at Michael Owen’s Manor House Stables.
The Boodles May Festival is an important fixture for the Palmer and Owen duo and Zoffee’s win in the race 12 months ago provided a memorable moment in the Winners Enclosure.
Palmer commented, “We don’t have runners unfortunately for the Classic Trials but I would expect that we will be represented in pretty much every other race over the course of the three days. Zoffee obviously will be the highlight, the Ladbrokes Chester Cup being the main race of the week. He is of course the defending winner and he is training really well- he will go for a racecourse gallop at Southwell later this week, in the same way that he did last year.
“He is a year older and 1lb higher than he was last year but he is still lower than when he was beaten a short head in the race in 2023 and I am really pleased with how the prep is going.”
Talking of the win in the race last year, Palmer said “Last year we felt that Zoffee was our best chance of the week and we have some agonisingly close shaves, short head seconds etc, so it was just perfect when Zoffee won on the last day. I’d say it was likely that Joe Leavy will ride him this year, as long as Joe doesn’t lose his 3lb claim.”
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