Scots Poet

The partnership with jockey Craig Nichol is worth noting. The two have raced together 24 times, producing 4 wins — roughly 1 in every 6 races. That kind of familiarity matters. A jockey who has sat on a horse that often knows exactly when to ask and when to wait, and the results suggest this is a pair who understand each other.

Trainer Ewan Whillans operates out of Hawick in the Scottish Borders, and this season his yard has sent out 28 winners — a strong output for a regional stable that rarely makes national headlines but clearly knows what it is doing. Scots Poet is one of the yard's dependable earners, and the numbers back that up. On normal ground, the horse wins 1 in every 4 races — 4 wins from 16. On wet or muddy ground, the same ratio holds: 2 wins from 8. That adaptability across conditions is genuinely useful and not something every horse can claim.

Sedgefield is where the story started, back in May 2022, and it remains a happy hunting ground — 2 wins from just 4 races there, which is a seriously impressive return of 50%. When a horse wins half its races at a particular track, that is not luck; something about the course suits the way it moves and races. Most of Scots Poet's career has been spent in Class 4 races — the solid, competitive middle tier of the sport — winning 3 from 22 at that level. Not spectacular, but honest and reliable. At ten, with form this sharp and a trainer in confident touch, Scots Poet is the kind of horse you would be very happy to find at a price.