The Secret Pearl

The recent form makes for genuinely encouraging reading. In the last six races, The Secret Pearl has finished fourth, fifth, second, second, and then won — and raced again just yesterday. Two seconds and a win in the space of a few months suggests a horse that has finally clicked into gear. That victory came at Market Rasen in April 2025, and it was the first time The Secret Pearl had reached the winner's enclosure in a career of near-misses. It is the kind of breakthrough that makes the yard — or rather, the team around the horse — dare to think there might be more to come.

Alex Hales, who trains out of Edgcote in Oxfordshire, has had a productive season with 12 winners already sent out from the yard. A trainer in that kind of form tends to know when a horse is ready to fire, and The Secret Pearl arriving in the winner's enclosure mid-season fits the picture of a stable operating with confidence. Most of the races The Secret Pearl contests are at Class 4 level — solid, competitive races without being the very top tier — and the record there reads 1 win from 10 attempts, or 10%. Again, not spectacular, but the placed finishes stack up, and the horse belongs at that level.

Jockey Harry Bannister has partnered The Secret Pearl in half of its career races — eight in total — and the pair have won once together, a rate of roughly 1 in every 8 rides. That is the winning partnership that clicked at Market Rasen, which matters. Horse and jockey who know each other are always a slightly more interesting proposition than a stranger in the saddle, and with The Secret Pearl clearly in decent form right now, another win before the season is out would surprise nobody who has been watching closely.