Baron Noir

His career began at Plumpton in December 2024, and he has been building steadily ever since. His most recent win came at Kempton Park in January 2026, and after that race, jockey Tom Bellamy — who rides Baron Noir in the majority of his races and has won 2 of their 5 outings together — was almost lost for words. He spoke about a horse who travels powerfully through races, who perhaps idled once he hit the front, but who he believes is "a hell of a good horse" with more still to show. That is not the kind of language jockeys reach for lightly. Bellamy also noted that Baron Noir had gone to Cheltenham — one of the most demanding tracks in Britain and the venue for many of the sport's biggest occasions — and mixed it with the very best, running well against top-level competition.

Alan King's yard has sent out 58 winners this season, which marks it as one of the more productive operations in the country. When a trainer of that standing says he never wanted to talk a horse up too much, it is worth paying attention to the implication: he was exercising restraint, not honesty. The Kempton win, on what sounds like fast, dry ground, was the performance that finally let the horse do the talking.

His recent form reads 3-4-4-1-1-2, which, read from right to left, shows a horse that climbed to back-to-back wins and has since settled into solid, placed efforts rather than dropping away. He raced just one day ago, so he is clearly being kept busy. With spring ground arriving — the firmer, faster conditions that Bellamy specifically flagged as likely to suit — Baron Noir looks like a horse whose best days may still be ahead of him.