Racing: Duo ends her second habit

DUO DROM, a mare who had finished runner-up in her last seven starts, finally ended the sequence yesterday when getting her head in front at the finish to the St Neots Handicap Chase at Huntingdon.

In all, Duo Drom has been the bridesmaid 14 times in a 26-race career, including 11 occasions in the last 12.

The mare's trainer, Di Haine, scored an across-the- card double when Dont Tell The Wife won at Lingfield. The eight-year-old escaped trouble at the sixth fence in the Attlee Novices Chase where Fantasy World fell, bringing down Suffolk Road, the 5-2 favourite, as well as an outsider, Dovehill.

Today's race meeting at Uttoxeter was called off yesterday evening after the saturated track was hit by further rain. Major David McAllister, the clerk of the course, said last night: 'We have had one and a half hours of rain which has broken the camel's back. It is still raining.'