Hickory

The most eye-catching entry on the CV is a Class 2 win at Ascot in May 2025, followed by another Ascot success in September of the same year. Ascot is not a track where ordinary horses win — it is one of the grandest stages in British racing, and Hickory has managed it twice. That September win came eight months ago now, but the horse raced just yesterday, which tells you the team at Jamie Osborne's Upper Lambourn yard still believe there is more to come.

Osborne's operation is in excellent health right now — 47 winners sent out this season alone — and Hickory has been a small but meaningful part of that. The trainer's daughter Saffie Osborne most often takes the ride, and the two have clicked well enough: 2 wins from 12 races together, a win rate of around 1 in 6, which is notably better than the horse's overall average. Family yards often develop a fine-tuned understanding of their horses, and this partnership looks like a good example of that.

One thing the data makes very clear is that wet and muddy ground brings out the best in Hickory. In those conditions, the record reads 2 wins from 6 races — winning 1 in every 3, which is double the overall average. On fast, dry ground the horse simply does not fire in the same way. Kempton Park is the other key detail: 2 wins from just 5 visits there, making it comfortably Hickory's most productive track. Most horses go a whole career without finding a course they genuinely love. Hickory has found two.

Day-to-day, this is a horse that typically lines up in Class 3 company, where the win rate drops to just 1 in 13 — which makes those Ascot performances all the more striking. Recent form reads 18-2-1-2-5-3, with plenty of near-misses mixed in. The wins have been hard-earned, but they have come on the biggest stages. For a horse in its eighth year, that is a career worth watching.