Carnation Queen

Her recent form tells an interesting story. Reading those last six results backwards, she was grinding away in mid-field — finishing sixth, sixth, sixth, fifth — before a run that suggested improvement was coming (second), and then the win. That kind of pattern, where a horse keeps plugging away without threatening and then suddenly clicks, is exactly what patient trainers wait for. Ollie Pears, who runs his yard out of Norton in North Yorkshire, has clearly been happy to give her the time she needed. Her team has sent out 11 winners already this season, so this is an operation that knows how to get horses ready.

The jockey partnership with Harry Russell is worth watching. She has ridden her in 5 of her 8 races and was on board for the win, giving them a record of 1 win from 5 together — 20%, or roughly 1 in 5. That is a meaningful number in racing terms, and the fact that Pears keeps putting Russell back on her suggests a level of trust in that combination. She raced just yesterday, so she is clearly being kept busy, and with York already on her record, there is every reason to think Carnation Queen has more to offer.