SATURDAY at Ascot was all about Vautour. Beforehand the talk focused on the excitement at his return, afterwards the talk was of how impressed or unimpressed you were.

Balanced against his tendency to jump to his left, and – in the context of the King George – the fact that Kempton is a tighter right-handed track than Ascot, is the fact that he put up a high-class performance, the magnitude of which may have been under-played. It was his seasonal debut, he hadn’t done much, he hadn’t even been away, yet he beat a race-fit Ptit Zig by a length and three quarters in a really good time.

At the root of all of this is the fact that Ptit Zig may be an under-rated horse, and that he may be an even better angle to take out of the race than the Vautour angle, which will always be high-profile. Paul Nicholls’ horse won well at Down Royal on his previous run despite not jumping well. He was conceding 5lb to Vautour on Saturday, and he pulled over 30 lengths clear of the 160-rated Third Intention, to whom he was conceding 4lb.

He could step up in trip, and he would be an interesting outsider in the King George, but this extended two and a half miles looks like a good trip for him for now. Some of his best performances have been at Ascot, so he will always be of interest when he races there. The Ascot Chase in February, the race in which he fell last year as a novice, looks like the ideal race for him again this term.