Waiting Patiently proves to Ruth Jefferson he has the legs despite Bryony Frost’s historic King George win on Frodon

Off the track for more than a year, Jefferson’s stable star was closing with every stride after the last as the front-running Frodon made all under Bryony Frost as she became the first female rider to win the celebrated race.

Waiting Patiently, who required surgery after finishing third in last December’s Tingle Creek Chase, was given a hold-up ride by champion jockey Brian Hughes as a number of more illustrious horses failed to fire.

However, Frost and Frodon kicked again off Kempton’s final bend, sinking the hearts of their closest pursuers before the Yorkshire challenger – owned by Richard Collins – emerged from the chasing pack after the second last fence with two-time winner Clan Des Obeaux a leg-weary third.

Since winning the 2018 Grade One Ascot Chase for Jefferson, the fragile and injury-prone Waiting Patiently has been placed in four successive races at the highest level.

But this was the nine-year-old’s first attempt at three miles and the fact that the horse appeared to stay the trip opens up new options for the Malton trainer – fitness permitting.

“It’s a hard race to weigh up. He started off a bit keen, then he raced a bit lazily, then he looked outpaced, then he looked like he made ground up effortlessly and then he stayed on like a train up the straight,” reflected Jefferson.

“He definitely got the trip. I don’t know what to think, as it is great and fabulous and all those things, but slightly gutting at the same time. I’m getting good at getting placed in Grade Ones.

“He is not a difficult horse to get fit, he is just a difficult horse to keep sound. He ran an absolute blinder, he just couldn’t quite peg the winner back.

“I don’t know (if he is a Gold Cup horse). To be honest we will have to get him home and make sure he is all right. He has won a Grade One and you would like him to win another one, as he has finished third in a Tingle Creek and King George. What more can you ask from the horse?”

Nothing, however, can be taken away from the aforementioned Frost whose win on Frodon was a 12th King George success for trainer Paul Nicholls.

In a year which has seen Hollie Doyle continue to break new ground on the Flat, the 25-year-old Frost passed Lucy Alexander’s total of 174 to become the winning-most female jump jockey in Britain – something she only realised she was on the brink of achieving on Christmas Day.

“That’s a few boundaries crossed today and a few moulds broken,” she said. “I’ve got a little book at home, dad (Grand National-winning jockey Jimmy Frost) used to do it. It’s a tiny little book and it has got the number of your rides, where it was, the horse, owner and trainer – from my very first pointing ride at Fleet Park, where I fell off at the last, to today.

“To put that in my book and to be thinking how many things we have achieved in one race is great. Hadden (Frost, brother) was on a WhatsApp video call (on Christmas Day) and he said ‘B’ do you realise you are one away from having the most winners as a female jumps jockey (in Britain).

“He said ‘imagine if you did it on Frodon in the King George?’. I just said ‘that doesn’t happen Hadden, stop being so silly’.

“I still can’t believe that me and Frodon can class ourselves a King George-winning pair. To me, though, I’ve won a King George on Frodon for Paul and the team and that is the big thing, regardless of the girl stuff, the winners and history.”

Meanwhile, Alan King’s progrssive steeplechaser Canelo jumped into Grand National contention when winning the Rowland Meyrick Chase at Wetherby on Boxing Day under jockey Tom Bellamy for owner JP McManus.

However, conditions at the West Yorkshire track were even more arduous 24 hours later when a mud-splattered First Flow justified favouritism to take the feature two-mile Castleford Chase.

An attritional two-mile race that saw three fences omitted due to the deteriorating ground, the David Bass-ridden First Flow showed great guts to prevail in a thrilling three-way finish from Eragone and The King Of May for trainer Kim Bailey.

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