Marquesas returned to the races after a 10-month break in eye-catching form to easily brush aside rivals to win the top-rated Non-Restricted Overnight Allowance event on Friday, October 23.

Jamai Raja (Oshane Nugent), Roy Rogers (Raddesh Roman) and imported speedster Graydon (Romario Spencer) set the early fractions for Marquesas to come calling.

Marquesas, with jockey Dick Cardenas in the saddle, blew past Roy Rogers at the furlong pole to run out an easy two-and-a-half-length winner in the end of the three-year-olds and upward event. Roy Rogers was second and Uncle Frank, the mount of Phillip Parchment, came home in third place.

The far-striding, five-year-old bay horse by Coded Warning out of the Devengate mare Islamorada completed 1,700m in a time of 1:45.0 minutes to register his first win since copping the Jamaica St Leger in 2018.

Trainer Michael Marlowe waited over two years on his charge to regain racing fitness and the in-form conditioner said that it was worth the wait.

“I never regretted one moment of that time we were made to wait. With a performance such as this, I am satisfied that he is back. For this, we gave him all the time he needed. He is a horse that we had to take chips out of both knees.

“Dr White did an excellent job on both knees, and when he returned to racing he ran a couple of races that produced two second-placed finishes and a fourth that was a useful sign of recovery in process of what was to come.

“At that stage, we were just waiting and Dr White returned to do an overall with Marquesas, and from then on, we keep him training and training and with some swimming like that, and this is the final result. This is 10 months wait [since he last raced on January 1] and he [ Marquesas] gave us an effort like this. He is back,” Marlowe said proudly.