Theanniversary Man

That back-to-back winning streak is the headline here. Win 1 in 7 over a career and you are a journeyman. Win 2 from your last 6 and suddenly you are a horse in form, one worth keeping an eye on. Since those wins, the form has dipped — a sixth, a seventh, and a sixth in the three runs that followed — but the horse raced just one day ago, which means James M Barcoe's yard in Gowran, Co. Kilkenny, clearly has no intention of giving him a long break. Seven winners sent out by the yard this season suggests a stable that is ticking along nicely, and active horses in working stables tend to be active for a reason.

The one puzzle in the picture is Niall Moore. The jockey who knows this horse best, having ridden him seven times, has yet to be aboard for either of those wins — zero from seven together is a striking stat, not necessarily a criticism of Moore, but it does make you wonder whether the wins came with someone else in the saddle and what, if anything, that tells us. A horse that wins without its regular rider is sometimes a horse that just needed the right conditions on the right day rather than a specific partnership to unlock it. Whether Moore gets another chance to change that record remains to be seen.

Theanniversary Man is not a superstar, but he is a live, in-form, actively campaigned horse with a trainer clearly confident enough to keep running him. In racing, that combination is often more than enough.