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Seraphim Angel put a smile on trainer Tom Dascombe's face when coming home strongly to land the Lilly Agnes Stakes on day one of the Boodles Chester May Festival.
The Tom Dascombe-trained filly made a promising start to her career when fourth at Newmarket on debut and certainly built on that to get off the mark on the Roodee.
Ed Dunlop's Lady Lightning and the well-backed Flicka's Girl were always towards the fore in the five-furlong two-year-old dash. The two continued to battle it out entering the Chester straight but all the while, the eye was drawn to Seraphim Angel, who showed a bright turn of foot to come over the top of the aforementioned pair before going away for a commanding one-and-a-half-length success under the French-born rider Pierre-Louis Jamin.
Flicka's Girl won the battle for the silver medal spot with the Lady Lightning a further length and a half back in third.
"She went to Newmarket, we're not hard on them at home and she didn't know what to do when she came off the bridle. She clearly had learnt a lot today," said Dascombe of the winner, who was leading home a one-two for the super first-season-sire Sergei Prokofiev.
"We'll see how she is, but she's got loads of speed, so I would suggest she'll go to York for the Listed Marygate Stakes (next week).
"She's won a £20,000 bonus today and the prize-money is always brilliant at Chester, so she's more than paid for herself already. I love her."
Dascombe, who has not long moved back to Lambourn to train, added: "It was difficult moving back to Lambourn with so few horses and then last year we put all our yearlings in a pre-training yard that got strangles, with a lot of the horses we couldn't give them a winter prep.
"This is the first time in two years that we've had a clear run at actually getting them ready and I think we've had four runners and that's my second winner.
"I'm delighted, I love two-year-olds and it's great to have a winner at Chester in this race. I love this race, I love the people here, who are all so welcoming and friendly."
