Alla Stella

That one win came at Kempton Park back in July 2024, and it remains the defining moment of her career so far. Twenty-two months on, she hasn't been able to repeat the trick, though her recent form suggests she's been running well without getting her nose in front — a sequence of 2-1-4-3-9-3 going back through her last six outings shows a horse that finished second on her most recent outing before that win, and has continued to knock on the door since. The 9 in that sequence stands out as an off day, but horses have them.

She runs out of the Newmarket yard of Sir Mark Prescott Bt, one of British racing's most meticulous and respected trainers. Prescott is famous for placing his horses carefully and getting the best out of them over time, so the fact that Alla Stella has been placed so often without winning again is worth watching — when a Prescott horse starts running like this, a win is rarely far away. The yard has sent out 48 winners already this season, which speaks to a team firing on all cylinders. Alla Stella raced just yesterday, so she's very much in the thick of things right now.

At four years old, she still has time to add to that solitary win. The places are nice, but Kempton in July 2024 remains the one time everything clicked — and for her the yard, the job now is finding the right spot to make it happen again.