Lady Mariko

Her record at the lower levels of racing, where she typically competes, is actually encouraging. At Class 5 races, she has won 2 of 12 outings, a rate of better than one in six, which shows she has genuine ability at that standard. Her breakthrough came at Wetherby in early June 2025, and she added a second win later that year, but her most recent success came at Kempton Park six months ago. Since then, nothing. Her last six races have yielded a run of 10th, 10th, 6th, 18th, 6th, and 11th—a dispiriting sequence that suggests either bad luck, fading form, or that she has simply had to try harder races than she can quite manage. The 18th place finish stands out as a real struggle, the kind of result that makes a trainer sit down and think about what might be wrong.

That said, Lady Mariko raced only yesterday, which means Dylan Cunha's Newmarket yard is still finding suitable opportunities for her. The trainer, who has sent out 45 winners this season, clearly hasn't given up on her. For a four-year-old mare, time is not quite running out—there is still scope for her to rediscover the form that brought those three wins—but the clock is ticking. She will need to break her current drought soon, otherwise the gap between races and races where she actually wins will become difficult to justify.