Trainer Tony Carroll hit a new milestone when he passed the £1 million prize money mark for the first time in his 30-year career when Secret Mistral finished third at Wolverhampton on December 15.

Justcallmepete had already played his part in Carroll passing £1m by winning handicaps at Kempton and Chelmsford, and he further added to the pot when completing his hat-trick in the valuable Timeform Sprint Series Final.

Carroll has now sent out an incredible 126 winners this year. The Worcestershire trainer first registered a century of winners in a calendar year in 2024, when he had 106.

Trainer Dan Skelton passed the £2m mark for the season when Kadastral was successful at Newbury.

Skelton is in pole position to lift the trainers' championship after accumulating £2,066,660 since April, with 95 winners.

Harry Vigors enjoyed a dream start to his career, as the 16-year-old landed his first winner on only his second ride, prevailing on Me Tarzan in a photo finish for Archie Watson at Lingfield on December 17.

Vigors said: "I can’t thank the whole team at Archie’s enough for the work they’ve done. Over the next year I just want to build lots of connections and ride as many winners as possible.”

The youngster finished second on his first ever ride under rules on the 20-1 shot Queen Sansa for Stuart Williams in the 1m 4f handicap, finishing behind the Tony Carroll-trained Upepo.

On the same card, Luke Morris landed a 989-1 four-timer across the card, kick-starting it on the Michael Appleby-trained Intervention in the 6f handicap.

That was followed by victories on Blue Nguru in the 5f novice and Spirit Of Athene in division one of the mile novice. He completed the feat on Fulford Cross in the 7f handicap for David Simcock.

Peter Moore