Rivet and Atzeni try to press home Doncaster advantage

3.50 Doncaster
Racing Post Trophy | 2yo colts & fillies | Group 1 | 1m | C4/ATR

Rivet bids to return Lester Piggott to the Racing Post Trophy roll of honour as the colt attempts to put behind him his Dewhurst Stakes disappointment.

Piggott, who won the last British Group 1 race of the Flat season five times as a jockey, is one of four members of the Starship Partnership. Des Scott, Rivet's South African octogenarian breeder, Sue Magnier and Michael Tabor are the others.

Rivet boasts course form, having beaten Thunder Snow a head in the Group 2 Champagne Stakes in September, but he finished one place behind that rival when they met again in the Dewhurst, when they filled fourth and fifth in the Newmarket Group 1 won by Churchill.

Trainer William Haggas, Piggott's son-in-law, said: "I wasn't planning on him running in the Dewhurst and this race, but he's in good form and I hope the ground will stay relatively decent. In the last few years the race seems to have been run on very soft ground, which isn't his cup of tea. I hope it stays reasonable.

"He didn't run as well as I'd hoped in the Dewhurst. I think he can do better. I'm not sure he enjoyed the track too much, so we'll see what he can do. Everyone keeps telling me a mile is what he needs."

Piggott, who won his first Racing Post Trophy on Ribocco in 1966 and his last on Lanfranco in 1984, is the joint most successful jockey in the race with the late Pat Eddery.

But he never won the race three years running, as Andrea Atzeni has, with the jockey now bidding for a four-timer on Rivet at a track where he has a remarkable big-race record.

Pros Course winner with Group 1 experience

Cons Disappointed in Dewhurst, vulnerable to improver