Ms Claire O'Connell

Her most reliable partnership is with jockey James Smith, who has ridden 2 of those winners from 26 rides together — a win rate of around 8%, which is notably better than the yard's overall figures. That suggests Smith and O'Connell have found some kind of understanding, and when he's in the saddle, the horses tend to perform closer to their potential. By contrast, the four races she has run alongside Jesse James Howard have produced nothing yet — a small sample, but one to watch.

Where O'Connell does show a clearer pattern is on normal ground conditions, where she has won 2 races from 40 — a 5% win rate that sits above her overall season average. It is a modest edge, but in a yard still finding its feet, any consistency is worth noting.

She set up her operation in 2021, which means she is still in the relatively early stages of building a string and a reputation. The honest truth is that 3% is a tough number — most established trainers are working somewhere between 10% and 20% — but context matters. Small yards with limited resources often have leaner spells, and four years in, O'Connell is still in the phase where every winner is a building block rather than a given. The question heading into the next season is whether this year represents a dip, or something harder to turn around.