The Tatling brought the curtain down on his racing career with a fairytale victory at Wolverhampton.
Making his 176th and final racecourse appearance as a 14-year-old, Milton Bradley's pride and joy was searching for an unlikely victory in the Dine In Horizons Restaurant Handicap.
The 2004 King's Stand winner was slowly away, but Richard Kingscote was happy to play the waiting game in the rear, and though Grand Stitch looked to have stolen a march on his rivals rounding the turn for home, The Tatling rattled home out wide to get up on the line for a short-head win, the 18th of his career.
Bradley said: "I know it was only a small race, but what a wonderful story. The horse is still a star in our eyes."
"He's one of those you drop on by mistake and spend the rest of your life looking for another one half as good. So many people in the country must know about him - it's unbelievable.
"He wasn't the easiest to train and it took us a while to get to know him. We learnt how he liked to come through horses and use that turn of foot in the last furlong - that's how he won the King's Stand Stakes at Royal Ascot.
"When we went there we thought if we finish in the first half we'll be lucky and then for him to go and win it and win it quite easily was something marvellous. He's been a marvellous servant for everyone involved with him.
"A lot of the people who try to tell you what to do really don't understand your horse. If the horse didn't like racing and wanted to be retired two years ago, we'd have done it. We tried to retire him and he didn't want to know. He was so miserable.
"We're going to have to be very cautious now how we treat him as he won't want to be left without going out and seeing life. Nobody is more excited about the win than I am."
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