The Thames Boatman

Those circumstances, as it turns out, are fairly specific. He loves normal ground conditions — not too soft, not too firm — and on a good surface he wins roughly 1 in every 4 races (7 from 26), which is a genuinely impressive conversion rate for a horse running at this level. More strikingly still, he has become a specialist at Lingfield Park, winning 4 of his 14 races there. That is not luck. Winning more than 1 in every 4 visits to the same track speaks to a horse that genuinely suits the course — likely its tight turns and all-weather surface — and Richard Hughes, who trains him out of Upper Lambourn, has been smart enough to keep going back. Hughes has been in excellent form this season, sending out 60 winners from his Berkshire yard, so The Thames Boatman is well placed.

His regular partner in the saddle is Finley Marsh, who has ridden him in 28 of his races and won 5 of them together — a win rate of around 1 in every 6. Marsh knows the horse well and has spoken about how The Thames Boatman needs a pace-honest race to be at his best — he likes having something to chase down, and when a race is run at a decent clip, he can be devastating. The flip side is that he has a tendency to hang in the closing stages, which has cost him on occasions when races have been there for the taking.

His recent form is as strong as it has been for a while: in his last six races he has finished fourth, first, second, ninth, second, and sixth. That single poor run aside, he has barely put a foot wrong. His latest win came at Goodwood just four weeks ago, and with a race under his belt just yesterday, he is clearly fit, healthy, and in the middle of a productive spell. For a six-year-old who first won back in October 2022 at Wolverhampton, he shows no sign of slowing down.