Saba Desert

The wins themselves tell the story. Saba Desert broke through at Sandown Park in June 2025, then stepped up to one of the top races in Britain — a Class 1 at Newmarket's July course — and won that too, less than a month later. Winning at the highest level as a two-year-old, at a track as sharp and unforgiving as Newmarket, is the sort of performance that gets people very excited about what comes next. The July course in particular rewards horses with real speed and class, so there was no flattering the result.

The one question mark is timing. Saba Desert has not raced for around five months now, returning from a break that will have had supporters watching the calendar nervously. Horses can come back sharper after a rest, or they can need a run to find their rhythm again — there is no way of knowing until they are back on the track. What helps is that this horse is in the hands of Charlie Appleby, one of the most powerful operations in British racing. His Newmarket yard has sent out 122 winners already this season — that is not a team that sends horses out underprepared. When Appleby says a horse is ready, it usually is.

At two years old, with a Class 1 win already on the board and a perfect record of hitting the frame in every single race, Saba Desert arrives back from that break with a profile that would turn heads in any paddock. The next few months will tell us whether this is a horse to follow all the way through to the classics, or simply a very good two-year-old. Either way, it has already earned the right to be watched closely.