Paul Stephen Kiely

The most eye-catching relationship in Kiely's operation is also, on paper, the most puzzling. Jockey Cian Quirke has partnered his horses 24 times without a winner — a run of blanks that would test anyone's patience. And yet the partnership clearly endures, which suggests a working relationship built on something beyond pure results: trust, perhaps, or a shared belief that the wins will come. Twenty-four rides together is a serious commitment; you don't keep putting the same jockey up unless you see something worth persisting with.

Where Kiely does find his best results is on normal ground — the kind of standard conditions that suit a well-prepared, straightforward horse. Three of his three winners this season have come on that surface, a win rate of around 1 in every 9 races in those conditions (11%), which stands out sharply against his overall figures. It suggests he knows how to have a horse ready when the track is at its most fair and predictable. Black Soul has been part of that picture too, winning once from five races together — a partnership that has at least produced on the scoresheet, even if consistency has been hard to find.

Four years in, Kiely is still writing the early chapters of his training career. The foundations are there — a preferred surface, a jockey he believes in, and a horse he keeps coming back to. The breakthrough season, when the numbers start to reflect what the yard is capable of, is still ahead of him.