Mano Chicago

The recent form tells an interesting story. Looking at the last six races, the pattern reads 2-4-2-5-2-5 — three runner-up finishes sandwiched between races where it dropped out of contention. It raced just yesterday, so this is a horse very much in the thick of its campaign right now. The fact that it keeps running second suggests it belongs at a decent level, but something — whether pace, luck, or a rival just a fraction better — has kept the winning moment at arm's length.

Ben Coen has been in the saddle for 7 of those 9 career races and is still waiting alongside the horse for that breakthrough, making them something of a partnership built on near-misses. That kind of consistency in the booking suggests the team at Murtagh's yard clearly believe in what the horse can do — they keep putting their trusted rider up. Murtagh himself is having a productive season, having sent out 53 winners so far this term, which is a yard operating in fine health. Mano Chicago, then, is not short of quality support around it.

The question now is whether the finishing second is a ceiling or simply bad luck. Some horses find winning, and when they do, the floodgates open. Others spend their careers as the best loser in the field. At 4 years old and with a trainer in form, there is still every reason to think Mano Chicago's moment is coming — it just has not arrived yet.