Qaasid

His trainer John Joseph Hanlon, who operates out of Bagenalstown in County Carlow and has sent out 11 winners already this season, put it plainly a couple of years back — Qaasid is hard to criticise because he tries every time. That might sound like faint praise, but in racing it genuinely isn't. Plenty of horses with more talent give far less.

Where Qaasid becomes genuinely interesting is over a specific distance. At one mile three furlongs to one mile four furlongs, he has won 4 of his 14 races at that trip — that's 29%, or roughly 1 in every 3 and a half starts. For context, that is more than twice his overall win rate. Get him in the right conditions at the right distance and you have a meaningfully different horse. Hanlon has also noted that Qaasid does his best work on all-weather surfaces rather than grass, which narrows the target further — but usefully so.

His most recent win came at Doncaster in July 2024, nearly two years ago now, and he has not found the winner's enclosure in his last six races. He raced just yesterday, which tells you he is fit and active, though recent form has been mixed — a second-place finish is the highlight of that current sequence. The partnership with jockey Graham Lee is worth watching when it comes together: the two have won 2 of their 6 races together, a win rate of 33%, or roughly 1 in 3, which is a sharp number by any measure.

At Class 4 level — the kind of races that sit comfortably in the middle of the sport's competitive ladder — Qaasid has won 3 of 11, again around 1 in 4. He knows his level, and his level suits him. A horse that tries every time, at the right trip, on the right surface, with the right jockey up: the formula for another win is fairly clear. Whether it arrives soon is another matter.