Character Testing

The five-year-old is trained by Mark Walford at Sheriff Hutton in North Yorkshire, a yard that has sent out 35 winners this season and clearly knows what it is doing. The puzzle, then, is what to make of a horse that keeps finishing second and third without converting. The most recent six runs tell a familiar story: a pair of blanks, then two place finishes, then a third, then another mid-pack effort in seventh — active and consistent, but not a winner.

The clearest pointer to Character Testing's best chance of winning again comes from the distance record. At a mile and one to a mile and two furlongs, the horse has won 1 from 5 races — a 20% win rate, which works out to roughly 1 in every 5 races at that trip. That is a completely different animal to its overall record and suggests the yard knows exactly where this horse is most dangerous. Most of its racing has come in Class 5 company, the bread-and-butter level of British racing, where it has won 1 from 13 — about 1 in every 13 races at that level, which is modest.

Regular partner Mr Jack Andrews has ridden the horse eight times without a win between them, which is a combination that has yet to click. Character Testing raced just one day ago, so the yard are clearly keeping the horse busy and looking for an opening. Whether that opening comes around again is the question — but if it does, a mile-plus trip at Southwell would be the obvious place to look.