ONE phrase stuck out in many of the reviews of the week’s action and it came in respect of Silver Streak’s win in the Christmas Hurdle. He had put up a good time and was worthy of Champion Hurdle consideration… “despite having many miles on the clock”. God forbid, we are all judged so harshly!

It was a good week for a few horses who could be put in the same category. In times where we accept horses running just two or three times a season, salute two more Grade 1 heroes in Frodon and Sharjah.

It brought to mind an old line from the one and only Mick Channon, shutting off a few reporters with when one made a suggestion about his well-raced filly Golden Silca whom he ran often at the top level.

“She’s a racehorse not a hooker so it doesn’t matter if she’s been on the go a long time.”

Though they have been around a long time, Silver Streak and Sharjah have both just turned eight and Frodon, on the go since that terrific Triumph Hurdle of 2016, is now only nine, once considered the peak for a chaser.

Silver Streak has 32 runs for eight wins. He began his career with a second placing on the flat in July 2015 for Ann Duffield. She sent him over hurdles in August of his three-year-old year but he only made his first visit to the winner’s enclosure at Taunton in a maiden hurdle in December 2016.

Frodon has run 38 times for 16 wins, winning a maiden hurdle when he was three in 2015. He was eighth to Ivanovich Gorbatov in the 2016 Triumph Hurdle with Apple’s Jade, Footpad and Clan Des Obeaux ahead of him and Sceau Royal behind.

Sharjah has 30 runs for eight wins and four Grade 1s and was a faller at the last in another as well as being brought down in a Champion Hurdle before his second last year and he also won the Galway Hurdle. He too began his career as a two-year-old in 2015 when last of six in a Longchamp maiden under Olivier Peslier.

Compare them with Santini’s 12 runs under rules and Al Boum Photo’s 16. For all the miles on the clock, the three were among the more welcome winners of the Christmas spell.