Hours after being surrounded by a stable fire, the Jamie Osborne-trained Constanzia has won a race at Chelmsford.
Osborne, a former leading National Hunt jockey turned Flat trainer, said the fire destroyed a tack room at his stables in Upper Lambourn.
He was thankful all horses and staff were unhurt while the fire – which had started in staff quarters in the early hours of Saturday – was eventually extinguished.
Osborne, who has had multiple Royal Ascot winners, sent a series of tweets updating the dramatic events – eventually culminating in his reaction to the success of Constanzia at Chelmsford.
After the juvenile filly’s victory, the stable’s first of this month, Osborne tweeted again from the scene of the previous night’s fire – prefacing his thoughts with the words: “There is a God!!”
“I will confess now to being slightly emotional,” he said.
“This is where I was standing last night with Constanzia, trying to comfort her because we couldn’t get her out – her box was too close to the flames.
“Do you know what? All credit to her – she’s just gone and won at Chelmsford. Amazing, what a wonderful filly!”
Earlier, Osborne told Press Association Sport it had been a difficult night.
“The fire was in a staff house, which is surrounded by 10 stables. Thankfully nobody was hurt – we managed to get all those horses out safely, and the fire didn’t get to the main stables.
“This all happened at 4am, and I have no idea what caused it at this stage.”