SATURDAY’S all-weather card at Lingfield suffered from by a boycott over prize money, which meant that one race was a walkover and another had no declarations at all. Nonetheless, we got to see a couple of strong contests in the Group 3 Winter Derby at 10 furlongs and the Listed Hever Sprint.

Wissahickon won the former emphatically at long odds on and is right up there with the best fully developed performers seen on the surface in Ireland and Britain (Enable won on the all-weather, of course, but much earlier in her career).

His overall time was nothing special by his own high standards – worth a timefigure of 109 – but he scorched through the last two furlongs in 10.7s then 11.3s and can be rated 122, which is in line with his best previously. Wissahickon is justly odds on for the Easter Classic at this course on AW Finals Day.

FASTER

Gorgeous Noora was even faster late on (21.8s) in the Hever, but her race was at half the Winter Derby’s overall distance. Her 105 timefigure gets raised to 108 on sectionals, and she is proving to be yet another advert for the skills of her trainer, Archie Watson.

Meydan’s last Thursday week’s card saw major wins from Mythical Magic (121 timefigure) in the Group 2 Zabeel Mile, Spotify (84) in a slowly run Group 3 Dubai Millennium and Divine Image (104) in the UAE Oaks, as well as a very smart winning handicap performance from Ekhtiyaar (119).

All those bar Spotify are trained by Charlie Appleby, and Mythical Magic, who beat the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes third Century Dream by three lengths, now looks like making into the top-class miler he hinted at becoming at two years.