Top Of The Bill

That Exeter record is the headline. Three wins from four races at the same course isn't luck — it's mastery. For context, most horses never win at a track twice, let alone three times in four attempts. Something about the track suits this horse perfectly, and any time Top Of The Bill heads back to Devon, that record is worth paying attention to.

The bulk of those wins — five of the seven — have come in Class 3 races, where the record stands at 42%, better than winning 2 in every 5. That's a horse that knows its level and operates at the top of it. The recent Class 2 win at Haydock Park last November is the standout result, though. Class 2 means one of the better races in Britain outside the very top tier, and winning one at 10 years old says this horse still has its best form in it.

Jordan Nailor has been in the saddle for most of it, riding in 17 of those races and winning 6 of them — that's a 35% win rate together, fractionally better than the horse's overall average, which suggests the partnership has been a good one. Behind them, the operation is run by Nigel and Willy Twiston-Davies out of Naunton in Gloucestershire, a yard that has sent out 61 winners already this season. That's a busy, successful training operation, and Top Of The Bill has been a consistent contributor.

Raced just one day ago and still active, the recent form shows two wins from the last six outings alongside a couple of below-par efforts — the kind of profile that suggests a horse in decent nick but not quite at peak. The big question now is whether there's another big-day performance left in a horse who, at 10, has already proved it can deliver when the occasion calls for it.