Bosphorus Rose

The most striking thing about Bosphorus Rose is what happens when the conditions are right. On normal ground, this horse has won 3 of 5 races — that is 60%, a remarkable hit rate that tells you the team knows exactly when to aim high. Equally telling is the preference for longer distances: at a mile and six furlongs up to two miles, Bosphorus Rose has won 4 of 6 races, or two in every three attempts. That is not a coincidence — it is a horse that genuinely gets better the further it runs, which is a rare and valuable quality. Stamina horses tend to improve with age too, which means the best may still be ahead.

The recent form makes for interesting reading. Reading right to left — 1, 6, 3, 11, 3, 1 — you can see two wins bookending a patchy middle spell. That eleventh-place finish looks like an outlier for a horse of this quality, but the response has been sharp: back in the winner's enclosure at Roscommon just this week. The trainer, P Twomey, operates out of Cashel in County Tipperary and has sent out 35 winners already this season, so this is a yard that knows how to get a horse ready.

Jockey Luke Morris has been the regular partner, riding Bosphorus Rose in 7 of its 13 races and winning 2 of them — roughly 1 in every 3 rides together, which is a solid relationship at this level. The horse typically competes at Class 5, which is towards the everyday end of British racing, though it has the win rate of something that could be tested at a higher level before long. A horse winning 5 from 13 overall, and 4 from 6 over its preferred trip, has every right to step up in grade. Whether the team decides to try that is the interesting question hanging over the rest of the season.