Cougar Force

What makes the picture a little puzzling is the level at which Cougar Force is competing. Class 5 is the bread-and-butter tier of British racing, the kind of race where horses are expected to be competitive rather than simply making up the numbers. Yet across four races at that level, the win column remains empty. A horse that cannot score at the easier end of the scale clearly has something to prove.

The trainer is Heather Main, who operates from Kingston Lisle in Oxfordshire and has sent out 17 winners already this season — a yard clearly capable of getting horses to the line first. That makes the lack of a win from Cougar Force something of an open question rather than a reflection on the operation around it. Main's team know how to prepare a winner; this particular horse just hasn't delivered on that yet. Having raced as recently as yesterday, Cougar Force is very much an active project, and at three years old there is still time for the penny to drop.