Lord

Donald McCain, who trains out of Cholmondeley in Cheshire, has had a busy season — 55 winners sent out from his yard this campaign alone — and Lord arrived there as a notably expensive purchase, having been bought for £70,000 at Doncaster after winning three races for his previous trainer Olly Murphy. That kind of price tag brings expectation with it, and so far Lord has lived up to it. McCain noted even before the Aintree win that the horse's jumping had improved with every run, and that he had been winning impressively. When a trainer uses the word "impressively" about a horse that cost £70,000, it is worth paying attention.

The Aintree victory itself came in conditions that were probably too wet and soft for Lord at his best — McCain admitted as much afterwards, saying the ground was a bit soft for him, yet he got away with it. That speaks to something. A horse who wins a top-level race under conditions that do not suit him is a horse with a bit of quality in reserve. McCain's description of Lord as "professional, honest and tough" is the kind of language trainers use about horses they genuinely like. It is not flashy praise, but it means something.

At Class 1 level, Lord has won 1 from 3 races — roughly one in three at the very top tier — and his overall record of 4 wins and 7 places from 10 races means he has finished in the first three in 11 of his outings combined, which is a remarkable level of consistency. His recent form reads 7-3-9-2-1-6, with that Aintree win sitting in the middle — a bump either side, but the talent clearly there. With a possible Musselburgh trial and a return to Aintree in April on the horizon, and the Fred Winter also in the picture, there are some interesting days ahead for this horse.