Grain d'Oudairies

The ten-year-old is trained by Donald McCain at Cholmondeley in Cheshire, a yard that has sent out 55 winners already this season — one of the more productive operations in the north of England. McCain has been candid about this horse's story: a win at Doncaster, a horrible fall at Wetherby when he was full of running, a race at Carlisle where he almost certainly would have won had he not blundered the last fence. That combination of talent and bad luck, plus the odd error at crucial moments, is probably why a horse with genuine ability is still competing at Class 4 level rather than something bigger. But McCain's view is clear — he has always believed there is a decent race in this horse when everything clicks into place.

The record backs up that belief. A 29% win rate across his career — roughly 3 wins from every 10 races — is genuinely good at this level. He has won 7 from 24 overall, but the interesting detail is Bangor-on-Dee, where he has won 2 of his 5 races. That is a 40% win rate at one track, which is the kind of figure that makes punters sit up. He won there for the first time in November 2022, and he was back winning there again just this week — last raced only yesterday, placing him among the most active horses in the yard right now.

Brian Hughes has been in the saddle for the majority of his career, riding him in 17 of his 24 races and partnering him to 4 of those 7 wins. That is a win rate of roughly 1 in every 4 rides together — a genuine partnership rather than a revolving door of jockeys, which in itself tells you something about the trust the team has in the combination.

At Class 4, he has won 4 from 12 races — 33%, or 1 in every 3 attempts. McCain thinks he wants two miles around the bigger tracks, and the recent Bangor win suggests the horse is in form right now. Whether the big race that has always seemed just around the corner finally arrives, this is a horse worth watching.