Kind Of Blue

The overall record reads three wins and eight places from 11 races, which works out at winning roughly 1 in every 4 races — a genuinely solid return, especially when you consider that 7 of those 11 races have come at the very top level of competition. At that elite tier, Kind Of Blue has won 1 from 7, or about 14% of the time. That might sound modest, but just being competitive at Class 1 week after week is an achievement most horses in training never reach. The career started at Kempton Park in April 2024, and the progression from a first win there to a top-level success at Ascot six months later is a real story of development.

The recent form makes for interesting reading: finishing 11th, then 2nd, then 3rd, then 8th, then winning, then 2nd, reading from most recent backwards. That's a horse whose form has dipped since the Ascot high — the 11th-place finish last time out is the least encouraging number here — but there's clearly talent to call on when conditions click. Five months off the track is a significant break, and how a horse returns from that kind of layoff can tell you a great deal about where it's headed.

James Fanshawe's Newmarket yard has sent out 45 winners this season, which marks it as a productive, well-organised operation that knows how to place horses to their strengths. Regular partner Daniel Muscutt has ridden Kind Of Blue in 9 of its 11 races, winning 2 of them — roughly 1 in every 4.5 rides together. That level of continuity between horse and jockey matters: Muscutt knows this horse, and that familiarity could count for plenty on a comeback run.