Laura Pearson

The last twelve months have been a leaner spell. Three winners from 84 rides — roughly 1 in every 28 races — is a modest return, and a 4% win rate is the kind of number that suggests a jockey grinding through a difficult patch rather than one hitting their peak. That said, volume matters in this sport. Eighty-four rides in a year means trainers are still picking up the phone, still putting her in the saddle, and that counts for something.

Her most regular employer is trainer David Loughnane, whose yard has given her 40 of those rides. One winner from 40 is a thin return — just 2%, or roughly 1 in every 40 races — but long partnerships like this are rarely just about winners. They speak to trust, to a working relationship built on familiarity with horses and the way a yard operates. You don't keep booking the same jockey 40 times if you've lost faith in them.

Where Pearson genuinely catches the eye is on slightly soft, wet ground. One winner from 9 races in those conditions might sound modest, but 11% — nearly 1 in every 9 — is meaningfully better than her overall numbers. Some jockeys have a feel for a wet track, for how to balance a horse when the ground is giving beneath them, and those figures hint that Pearson may be one of them. Her partnership with Rupert The Prince is worth watching too — a win from 3 races together suggests a horse and rider who have found something that works.

The headline, though, remains that Nottingham victory. For a jockey four years into their career, a top-level win is the kind of result that defines what comes next. Whether she can push back toward that level — and convert more of those 84 annual rides into winners — is the most interesting question hanging over her career right now.