SATURDAY’S Investec Derby answered many of the pre-race questions that needed to be answered, but it also posed a few new ones. That’s what Epsom’s Derbys do. That’s why they fascinate so much.

Masar was the best horse in the race on the day. That was the main question answered. William Buick always appeared to be happy on the Charlie Appleby-trained colt, to have him in the position in which he wanted him, and he stayed on as well, as his pedigree suggested he would, to run out an emphatic Derby winner.

By New Approach, a son of Galileo whom Jim Bolger trained to win the Derby 10 years ago, out of a Cape Cross mare who won the UAE Derby and the UAE Oaks over 10 furlongs, there was always a chance that he would improve for stepping up to a mile and a half. A nine-length winner of the Craven Stakes and third in the Guineas. Easy in hindsight, but 16/1 was big enough.

Perhaps the feeling was that the Godolphin colt had reached his zenith. It isn’t that he was lightly-raced. He raced three times in Britain as a juvenile, then finished third in the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere, then finished an unlucky-looking sixth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf. And he was well beaten in a listed race on dirt in Dubai on his first run in 2018.

He had raced in four different countries and on three different continents before his third birthday.

Maybe the Godolphin thing was a factor, that no horse racing in Godolphin blue had ever won the Derby. Perhaps the feeling was that Masar would not progress from the Guineas. It was a fine training performance by Charlie Appleby to get him to concert pitch again, a nine-length Craven winner who could only finish third in the Guineas.

The Godolphin thing was a little bit of a misdirect too. Lammtarra probably would have raced in Godolphin blue had Godolphin blue been a thing in 1995. New Approach probably would have raced in Godolphin blue had Godolphin-owned horses been ‘allowed’ to remain with ‘outside’ trainers in 2008. Like they were in 2015, when Jack Hobbs finished second to Golden Horn.

Even so, it was very good that it happened. It was very good for racing. It would be difficult to quantify the magnitude of Sheikh Mohammed’s investment in racing, or to imagine how things would be without it. And remember, no horse racing in Sheikh Mohammed’s own maroon and white colours ever won the Derby either.

It was a square peg into a square hole, the universe correcting itself, Godolphin winning the Derby, like Frankie Dettori winning the Derby, like AP McCoy winning the Grand National. It fits, it’s correct, it’s a state of equilibrium.