Peking Opera

Trained by the father-and-son operation of Gary and Josh Moore out of Lower Beeding in West Sussex — a yard that has sent out 99 winners already this season, so clearly no backwater outfit — Peking Opera has built a career record of 3 wins and 5 places from 19 races, winning roughly 1 in every 6. That is a modest number on paper, but the quality of his victories tells a more interesting story. His first win came at Leopardstown in October 2022, and he followed that up with a Listed race win at Navan — Listed races sit just below the very top tier of racing — which had the team talking openly about a tilt at the Queen's Vase at Royal Ascot. High ambitions for a horse that, by his trainer's own admission, is happy to dawdle around the gallops.

His most recent win came at Sandown Park in February 2024, now 27 months ago, and he has not found the winner's enclosure in his last 6 races since. Recent form makes for difficult reading — finishing eighth, seventh, and fourth in his last three completed runs — and he has been tried at the top level three times without winning any of those. That said, he raced just yesterday, so he is clearly still in training and still being tested.

What Moore said after the Sandown win is worth holding onto: he expected his horse to need a stiff two miles but was surprised by the turn of pace he showed. That kind of versatility — a horse that can stay all day but also quicken when asked — is exactly what trainers prize. Whether Peking Opera can rediscover that form at six is the open question, but a yard firing at nearly a century of winners this season is not short of confidence, and this horse has already shown he can win at a decent level when the mood takes him.