Light switched on in Gold Cup thriller

Hot favourite Leading Light narrowly denied defending champion Estimate in a pulsating climax to the Gold Cup at Royal Ascot yesterday.

Last year’s Queen’s Vase and St Leger hero Leading Light was all the rage for the two-and-a-half-mile Group One, having made a winning return to action in the Vintage Crop Stakes at Navan last month.

The four-year-old was under the pump from the home turn in the hands of Joseph O’Brien, son of trainer Aidan, but stuck to his guns admirably to fend off Estimate by a neck, with the front-running Missunited a gallant third.