HELIOSTATIC ONE OF THE TOP THREE YEAR OLDS

HELIOSTATIC (41) is a horse that I confess I hadn't seriously considered as a major player for the biggest races before he won the Meld Stakes in fantastic time last Saturday. Now that he has run so fast his record starts to look a whole lot simpler to understand. Clearly he failed to stay the twelve furlongs in the Irish Derby. Otherwise his form on good or faster ground has been nothing but brilliant. He lost by a length on his racecourse debut to Horatio Nelson who I rated the fastest two year old last year. Since then he's won all three times he's run less than 12 furlongs on a fast surface.

I now rate Heliostatic one of the best three year olds in Europe and fully expect him to be a force to be reckoned with in Group 1 races over ten furlongs in future.

COOL TOUCH IS PATTERN CLASS

COOL TOUCH (37) beat older horses to win a good 70-100 handicap over ten furlongs at Leopardstown in Listed class time. He's now won both times he's run beyond a mile and will stay a mile and a half if his trainer is right. I'd bet on him winning a Premier Handicap before long and then stepping up to do well in pattern company.

MEDICO DESERVES A SHOT AT PATTERN COMPANY

MEDICO (37) beat older horses to win a Premier Handicap at Leopardstown in very decent time. He's now won three of his five starts beyond a mile. One of the losses was a half length defeat by Reform Act who went on to place in Listed company on her next two outings. The other was a nine length second to the brilliant Galatee, who I rate the joint fastest three year old filly in Europe.

Medico is entered in a couple of Group races and deserves a shot at that level. He's improving according to my ratings and could basically be anything at this point.

TEO PERUGO A LIVE GALWAY PLATE CONTENDER

TEO PERUGO (38) won a strongly run conditions chase from a good field at Killarney in impressively fast time. He's a fast ground specialist that has finished first past the post in six of his last seven completed starts on ground faster than yielding. I wish his sole loss hadn't been at Galway because that somewhat dents my confidence about his chances in the Galway Plate. But his Galway defeat did come off a seven week break so maybe he needed the run. In any event, on the clock Teo Perugo now rates as one of the top contenders for the big race.

WALTONS MOUNTAIN (38) set a terrific pace and only just went under. He'd scored by wide margins in both his previous chases at trips short of two and a half miles and is clearly a very useful chaser at around two miles. He's fast enough to take a Grade 3 contest.

ALEXANDROVA

This is a very odd season for middle-distance three year old colts. Somehow most of the top performers have ended up in France, with a remarkably high percentage of them being trained by Andre Fabre. As a result Fabre has trained more Group winners than any other trainer in Europe to this stage. The normally dominant Coolmore operation headed by Aiden O'Brien are only in third place. And the best three year old O'Brien trains is a filly. But she's quite some filly as was demonstrated when ALEXANDROVA (40) repeated her brilliant Oaks win by taking the Irish Oaks at the Curragh.

Alexandrova ran a tad quicker at Epsom and would no doubt have done so here if she'd been pressed. She's the joint fastest middle distance three year old of either sex on my ratings and deserves to be given a shot at beating the colts. O'Brien suggested she may well be given the chance in the Champion Stakes at Leopardstown or the Arc once she's run in the Yorkshire Oaks. That in itself tells just how highly Alexandrova is regarded at Ballydoyle. Normally you can't pin O'Brien down to definite targets for the horses (sometimes not even in the week or on the very day of the race). When he's this clear about a horse's future programme he's invariably talking about a very smart horse indeed.

What's interesting is that there are still three 3YO fillies around who might just be able to beat Alexandrova. I'm talking about Jim Bolger's Galatee, Luca Cumani's new Italian recruit Dionisia and the top German filly Almerita. When Alexandrova meets one of these three it promises to be quite some race.

ROYAL INTRIGUE IS SMART

ROYAL INTRIGUE (39) has done nothing but improve all season, and he maintained the trend to win Roscommon's first pattern race, the Lenebane Stakes in solid Group class time. The rating I awarded him equates to good Group 2 class for a three year old in the Summer.

Given his rather speedy pedigree and the way he tired late when tried over 12 furlongs, I suspect that the ten furlongs of this race is Royal Intrigue's best distance. I note that he's entered over ten furlongs again in Leopardstown's Meld Stakes at the end of this month. He'd have a big chance there off this run.

Runner-up Blessyourpinksox (38) ran a big race last year on her seasonal debut to beat Common World and repeated the feat on her first start in six months here. She's probably best fresh and horses of this type tend to be good for their first two starts of the year. So now that she’s gone and won her next start I can't really recommend following her.

KALDERON (37) ran a good race to finish third. I'm beginning to think that he's best on tight tracks like Roscommon. He's won seven of the last ten times he's run on tracks that are ten furlongs or less in circumference like Roscommon but he's now lost all six times he's run around bigger ovals.

LITTLE NYMPH CAN KEEP ON WINNING

LITTLE NYMPH (37) won a good fillies handicap at Roscommon in Listed class time. Her trainer Michael Grassick says she needs cover. This may explain why she's finished out of the first three every time she's faced the wide open spaces of the Curragh and Leopardstown but won her last four starts elsewhere. She remains exceptionally well handicapped and hasn't stopped winning yet if my ratings are anything to go by.

OSTERHASE AS GOOD AS EVER

OSERTHASE (39) showed that he's good as ever when winning Ireland's most valuable sprint, the Rockingham handicap for the second time off a huge weight. He actually seems to thrive in handicap company, presumably because the competition is a bit softer than in Group races. He's now won four of the last five times he's run in five and six furlong handicaps on fast ground.

I wouldn't discount Osterhase's chances of winning the Prix Abbaye if the ground came up firm on the day. That race is often won by a horse with the kind of early speed Osterhase possesses.

Runner-up LEITRA (39) is a fast filly and adds weight to the idea that Ireland's current crop of three year old sprinters is the best in over a decade. She looks set to win in pattern company.

SPINNING QUEEN ONE ON THE BEST 3YO FILLIES

The early months of this season have seen few fast performances from three year old fillies. But in recent weeks we've seen several of them. One that was notable came in the Group 3 Brownstown Stakes at Leopardstown where SPINNING QUEEN (38) stayed on strongly to get up and beat fellow British raider Wake Up Maggie (38).

Wake Up Maggie looks to be a sprinter pure and simple, so she's going to be hard to place. But the way Spinning Queen finished suggests she ought to be given another shot at a mile. I see her as a good prospect to win something better before the season is out, provided she gets the fast ground she appears to need.

DSCHUNGEL SONG SHOULD WIN SOON

Claiming races tend to be pretty weak affairs, but the one run at Wexford recently certainly wasn't. It was the fastest race on the card and much faster than normal for the class. It was won by ANXIOUS MOMENTS (35) a decent jumper who has consistently shown equally good form on the flat. Even though he's eleven he was claimed and looks likely to win for his new connections in the near future.

Runner-up DSCHUNGEL SONG (33) is a horse I noted before when he improved tremendously for the step up to longer trips in Germany. He continued the improvement here and should have no trouble winning an ordinary handicap soon.

DYLAN THOMAS IS NO SUPER-HORSE

I confess that I was amazed to see DYLAN THOMAS (39) romp home in the Irish Derby. My ratings told me that the French runners were likely to dominate. But, having seen the result I figured I just had to have been mistaken. So I started making my speed ratings for the race on the assumption that I'd been totally wrong about the Coolmore colt and that he'd just turned in a very smart performance. But try as I might I just couldn't find any way of interpreting the time of the race to say that Dylan Thomas was as good as everyone else now seems to be making him out to be. Whatever way you cut it the clock says his run was basically a decent Group 2 performance for a three year old at this time of the year – completely in line with the rather ho hum times he'd recorded in the Derrinstown Stud Derby Trial and the Epsom Derby.

Toss out the French runners and the eight British and Irish runners Dylan Thomas beat don't amount to much. Four of them had only ever won in maiden company and three of them had never won at all.

I'm sorry, but I just can't buy into the idea that Dylan Thomas has somehow miraculously improved to become a super-horse after losing all but one of his previous four starts in Group company. My numbers say that the French horses ran below form for some reason and that he ran a very ordinary time for this class.

As I see it quotes as low as 5-1 for the King George and 7-1 for the Arc are bonkers. Dylan Thomas is nowhere near good enough to win races like that off this run.

KASTORIA IS A SMART MARE

KASTORIA (41) is the first mare that the Aga Khan has kept in training at five years of age in more than a decade. So he must clearly think she has good prospects of adding to her stud value by doing better than the Group 2 placing she's achieved so far. My speed ratings say he's right and Kastoria confirmed this when beating last year's Irish Leger winner COLLIER HILL (41) narrowly in the Curragh Cup.

Kastoria is not bred to handle mud, so I'm happy to chuck out her loss in soft ground at York. Otherwise she has now won or finished a close second to a horse that I rate Group 1 class in all seven outings following her losing racecourse debut. She must have a decent chance in the Irish Leger on this showing. That is her big target and obviously the main justification for keeping her in training.

Collier Hill is as good as ever judged on this run while MKUZI (40) was unlucky to come up against two Group 1 horses when bidding for a hat trick in this race. Both will surely be winning in their next few runs.

CHELSEA ROSE COULD TURN THIS FORM AROUND

I had thought that CHELSEA ROSE (39) would have the lead all to herself in the Pretty Polly Stakes. But Red Bloom (37) headed her early, ensuring she wouldn't be able to steal the race from the front. Nonetheless Chelsea Rose still nearly won, going under by just a neck to international star ALEXANDER GOLDRUN (39) who was winning her fifth Group 1.

Both Chelsea Rose and Alexander Goldrun have run a bit quicker in the past according to my speed ratings, and I dare say their trainers can produce improvement in both of them before the Nassau Stakes. No doubt Alexander Goldrun will be a warm order to confirm the form in that race but my ratings say there really is nothing between these two smart fillies. I can see Chelsea Rose turning this form around at Goodwood.

Red Bloom has now lost all six Group 1 races she's contested since her two year old days and looks likely to have a tough time winning again at the top level with so many good older fillies now in training

HOW GOOD IS TELEMACHUS?

The Apprentice Derby at the Curragh is often won by a decent horse, and TELEMACHUS (38) is almost certainly the best winner of the race so far. He bolted home by five lengths in a time that would win most Group 3 races. He followed up over the same course and distance a few days alter in a very valuable Premier handicap, scoring for the third time in a row. Cleary this six year old has improved markedly since being switched to Ireland. I'd bet on him to make it four in a row next time and would be wary of opposing him outside of pattern company.