Raindance Queen

She competes almost exclusively at Class 5, the lowest rung of British racing, where the competition is at its most accessible. And yet even here, across nine races at that level, she has not managed to win once. That is not a run of bad luck — that is a horse finding its ceiling and bumping against it, race after race. Her most recent form figures — 10th, 12th, 4th, 7th — suggest occasional glimpses of effort, particularly that fourth-place finish, but nothing that points toward a breakthrough.

James Best has stuck with her through nine of those races together, an unusually loyal partnership given the complete absence of reward. Nine rides, zero wins. At some point a jockey's faith in a horse becomes its own quiet story, though it has yet to produce a happy ending. Raindance Queen raced just yesterday, so whatever comes next is almost certainly not far away — but on the evidence of twenty starts and a lifetime of near-misses, it would take a brave person to expect something different this time.