Harbour Lake

Both of his most recent victories have come at Class 2 level, at Aintree in November 2024 and at Haydock in May 2025. Aintree is one of the most famous racing venues in the world, and winning there is never a fluke. After that November win, King was already thinking big — the Pertemps Final at the Cheltenham Festival, the sport's biggest meeting of the year, was mentioned as a live target. The plan was to give the horse a light campaign and point him at Cheltenham, which tells you something about how the yard rates him.

The Haydock win in May confirmed the belief. King's post-race comment was telling — he felt the horse was possibly carrying a few pounds too much weight under the rules, yet still won. When a trainer says that, what he means is: on a fair weight, this horse would have won more easily. That is the kind of performance that keeps a camp excited heading into the next season.

Much of that optimism is tied to jockey Tom Cannon, who has ridden Harbour Lake in 18 of his 24 races and won 5 of them — a win rate of 28%, or just over 1 in every 3.5 rides together. That is a strong partnership, and continuity between horse and jockey matters more than casual fans might realise; the horse learns to trust, the jockey learns the quirks. King's yard at Wroughton has sent out 58 winners this season, so this is not a small operation hoping for a lucky break. Harbour Lake, raced just yesterday and still very much active, looks like a horse with at least one big day left in him.