Ferdia

What makes Ferdia's record genuinely interesting is how much it tells you about persistence. John Patrick Ryan's yard in Templemore, Co Tipperary, has been in decent form this season with 21 winners sent out, so this isn't a struggling operation. Ferdia simply finds winning difficult, and that's not a criticism — plenty of horses compete at a level where they're consistently beaten by better rivals, and placing 14 times in 37 races means this horse has been competitive far more often than the bare win tally suggests.

The partnership with jockey Philip Donovan is worth noting, if only for its stubborn loyalty. Fourteen races together, zero wins — and yet they keep coming back. That kind of long-running combination without a breakthrough tells its own quiet story. Ferdia raced just yesterday, which means this is a horse still very much in active training and clearly trusted by the yard to keep lining up. Whether another win is coming at 10 years old, having not tasted victory in nearly four years, only time will tell — but Ferdia keeps showing up, and there's something to be said for that.