Master Builder

His big moment came at Haydock Park in September 2024, landing a Class 2 race — one of the top tier of races in Britain — and Menuisier was in no doubt what had made the difference. The ground had a bit of moisture in it, and the horse switched off beautifully as the field went hard early. "You could see he was picking up the bridle and travelling better than anything else," the trainer said afterwards. That is the language of a horse who was simply better than the rest on the day, not one who scraped home. His record on normal ground is just as telling: 2 wins from 5 races, a 40% conversion rate that puts him well clear of his overall figures and suggests the surface genuinely matters.

William Buick has been in the saddle for 5 of those 14 races, winning once together — a 1-in-5 partnership that mirrors the horse's overall record and hints at a settled working relationship rather than a rotating door of jockeys. Menuisier trains out of Pulborough in West Sussex and has sent out 20 winners this season already, so this is a yard in form.

Most recently, Master Builder won at York just this week — his first victory since Haydock, and a sign that the Menuisier camp felt the horse had something more to give. As recently as late July, the trainer was open about bigger ambitions: a run at Goodwood was being lined up, with the Ebor — one of the great staying handicaps at York — mentioned as a possibility if the horse's official rating climbed high enough. At a mark of 94, Menuisier described an Ebor entry as "fancy," but he left the door open. Horses who win Class 2 races and travel well on a loose rein tend to have a habit of making trainers revise their ambitions upward.