Frankie John

His recent form makes for interesting reading. Reading it from oldest to newest, he won, then placed third, then won again, then had a run that didn't produce a result worth noting, then placed fifth twice. Two wins in his last six races is a decent clip, and it shows a horse that has found a level and is performing consistently at it. His first win came at Galway in the summer of 2025, and he followed that up with a second at Leopardstown on St Stephen's Day — one of the busiest and most competitive racing days of the Irish calendar. Winning at Leopardstown at Christmas is no small thing; the track draws strong fields and serious horses. The fact that Frankie John handled that occasion says something about him.

He hasn't raced in 55 days, which amounts to a short, planned break rather than anything to worry about. Horses are routinely freshened up between runs, and coming back off a rest after a winning performance is a perfectly sensible place to be.

Behind him is Denis Gerard Hogan, training out of Cloughjordan in County Tipperary. Hogan's yard has sent out 58 winners already this season — a high-volume, results-driven operation that clearly knows how to place its horses in races they can win. A trainer posting those kinds of numbers isn't throwing darts in the dark; they are reading horses carefully and targeting the right opportunities. Frankie John's two wins in well-chosen spots look very much like the work of a yard that understands what it has and what to do with it.