William Buick returns in triumph on Notable Speech

Can Notable Speech be the next big sprinting star?

Timeform assessment of the sprinting division as Notable Speech aims to slot in at number one

By Lewis Tomlinson

Horse Racing

Sat July 12, 2025 · 5M ago

Lewis Tomlinson takes a look at the quality of the sprinting division according to Timeform rating over the last 15 years and wonders if Notable Speech can be the next sprint star.

'They all take turns at beating each other'

This accusation has often been angled towards Pattern-level sprinters in the UK and Ireland over the past couple of seasons, the division often criticised for a dearth in quality. Certainly, Charlie Appleby and Godolphin think the door is open for a bona-fide top-notcher to make their mark felt in the division, Notable Speech’s inclusion in the July Cup adventurous, but telling of waters calmer than swimming alongside the mile sharks Rosallion and Field of Gold.

A decade on from the brilliant Muhaarar winning this weekend’s feature contest - the second of his four Group 1s across that season, culminating in a world-class 134-Timeform rated performance at Ascot – Lewis Tomlinson analyses whether the drop off in quality amongst British and Irish sprinters is quite as stark as is perceived and where the next speedball of that calibre might come from.

The state of play

Disregarding juvenile contests, 11 Group races up to six furlongs have been run in Britain this season; Rumstar (119) has taken a brace of Group 3s, with Andre Fabre’s Sajir (114), Big Mojo (108) and Diligent Harry (117) also scoring at that level, whilst Group 2s have gone the way of Mgheera (114), Symbol Of Honour (115) and Inisherin, whose Timeform rating of 122 makes him the highest-rated speedster in Britain.

All three sprinting Group 1s in the first half of the year come at Ascot, with American Affair (120) taking the King Charles III, the filly Time For Sandals (113) proving best of the three-year-olds in the Commonwealth Cup and the French-trained Lazzat (125) pulling well clear with Japanese rival Satono Reve (123) in the Golden Jubilee to set a clear standard in Europe.

That’s a lot of names – and a lot of numbers – to say that we don’t have a sprinting superstar… and haven’t for some time.

Now, it’s worth contextualising that, in the years preceding the pandemic, racing fans were treated to a freakishly talented group of domestic sprinters; Battaash, Blue Point and Harry Angel all able to fire in 130+ performances on multiple occasions, with Marsha and the US-trained Lady Aurelia also breaking that barrier when filling the first two positions in the 2017 Nunthorpe. Mecca’s Angel never quite managed to breach the 130 ceiling, though her back-to-back 129-rated victories in the preceding renewals on the Knavesmire mean she’s also more than worthy a mention when discussing great sprinters of the era.

The Australian-trained Nature Strip (132) the only horse to since break that 130+ barrier on these shores, achieved when handing Twilight Calls a four-and-a-half length beating in the 2022 King’s Stand Stakes. In fact, the best performance since Covid by a British-trained sprinter came from the fragile Minzaal, who posted a rating of a 127 when blowing apart a quick-ground Sprint Cup back in 2022, his final career start having suffered a slab fracture to his knee in the process of that victory.

That being said, the average rating of the best British or Irish trained runner across recent five-year periods has been in gradual decline since 2010 across the majority of British sprinting Group 1s, the phenomenon maybe not quite as immediate as some may believe; that set of pre-pandemic superstars perhaps masking what was becoming an increasingly shallow pool of rivals for them to beat – or to capitalise at the top level in their absences.

The exceptions to this are the aforementioned period of absurd strength for the Nunthorpe between 2015 and 2019 and an unsurprising slight pick-up for the Champions Sprint after being repackaged from its former guise as the Diadem Stakes.

The traditional Royal Ascot open sprints have been the chief sufferers – most notably that of the Jubilee, the average peak rating of the leading local runner more than a half a stone lower than that of a decade earlier. Third-placed Flora Of Bermuda’s 109-rated effort was the best of the home team this year, that coming after a brace of successes for the veteran Khaadem.

The July Cup, another race that often has some international flavour to it – although not quite with the same amount of overseas success, has faced a slight deterioration, just as has the Sprint Cup. The Commonwealth Cup, introduced only in 2015, has also seen a reduction of 3.6lb in the average rating of its winner.

Trends within racing come and go, and most can be explained by market forces, which perhaps makes it even more surprising that an increasingly speed-focused breeding industry hasn’t translated to a better quality of sprinters on the track – though it probably wouldn’t have taken Nostradamus to predict that the likes of The Wow Signal, Cappella Sansevero and Coulsty wouldn’t prove major assets to the bloodstock world.

It’s hard to blame the Eastern-bound talent drain either for the lack of top sprinters on these shores at present, the sprinting divisions in Australia and Hong Kong - home to Ka Ying Rising (131), the best sprinter on Earth at present – regularly superior to their European counterparts and therefore rarely a source of much interest for their buyers.

In fact, it was a middle-distance export in the shape of Redkirk Warrior (127) the proved the biggest loss to the domestic scene on Timeform ratings. He won both starts over 10f for William Haggas prior to his reinvention as Group 1 winner over half that trip for David Hayes in Australia, though he failed to make an impact when returned to Britain for cracks at the Diamond Jubilee and July Cup.

Peniaphobia (125), a Super Sprint winner for Richard Fahey, continued to develop from Tony Cruz after being exported and is probably the most successful ex-British sprinter to have plied in his trade in Hong Kong, Kevin Ryan’s Prix Robert Papin winner Atomic Force and Wings Of War, who won a Mill Reef for Clive Cox, not really scaling the same heights during their time in the Far East more recently.

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It's also a salient point to make that the lack of a standout sprinter provides the sport with a different type of positive, giving trainers that fish in a different pool to the international heavyweight operations a chance to taste success at the top. The talents of Ed Bethell, Jim Goldie, Adam West and Julie Camacho – all of whom gained breakthrough Group 1 successes with their sprinters in recent seasons - have long been familiar to those who follow racing across all levels and it’s clearly healthy for the ecosystem of the sport for yards that lack the financial clout to mix at the top table over Classic distances to have a division where the big guns don’t quite possess the same depth as they do elsewhere.

Nevertheless, there are reasons to have some positivity for a potential upturn in the fortunes of domestic sprinters. Blue Point wasn’t at his best until aged five but has sired top-level sprint winners in Kind Of Blue and Big Evs from his first crop, whilst the similarly late-maturing freshman sire Starman has made an immensely encouraging start to his stud career, already with several promising daughters to his name, headlined by Albany Stakes winner Venetian Sun alongside Queen Mary runner-up Flowerhead and Lady Iman, a dual-Pattern winner in Ireland. Neither stallion could be accused of proliferating “cheap speed” into the breed by any means.

Things also make for kinder reading at minor Group level; races like the Duke of York – a sensibly-positioned seasonal return for many a top sprinter -, the Chipchase, the Coral Charge and the Bengough all maintaining a reasonably similar level of quality across the 15-year period.

The Palace House Stakes – remarkably won by a Group 1 scorer every year in the 2010s – and the Temple Stakes perhaps make for slightly disconcerting reading on the figures, but it stands to reason that these early season contests will always attract Group 1 performers in need of a comeback run and it was clearly an easier task for the likes of Kingsgate Native, Sole Power or Battaash to record a solid 120s figure in this type of contest than it is for Rumstar, as likeable as he is (and I wouldn’t put it past him landing a Group 1 victory himself this year!)

The good sprinters are still there – but it’s a new great we could do with finding and until then the gap in quality between Group 3 and Group 1s will remain more negligible than the Pattern designs.

Perhaps more so than in other any division, great sprinters often find their calling by accident rather than by design. Inisherin is out a Prix Jean Romanet-winning mare and had his first three career starts over one mile, Derby aspirations surely in mind at the beginning of his Classic season, but the pace he showed when leading a Guineas field for the best part of six furlongs clearly opened connections eyes to other possibilities.

Lazzat himself had two tries at a mile before he first tackled a bare six furlongs, whilst it’s easy to forget Muhaarar won a Greenham and finished mid-field in a Poulains before reverting to sprinting – you’d wager if either had shown the same aptitude over further, they’d have also been lost to the sprinting scene.

The July Cup has seen plenty of success for one-time milers switching disciplines; Alcohol Free and U S Navy Flag particularly well established over further before dropping back and Notable Speech, very much an enthusiastic sort with a sharp turn of foot, looks a tailor-made candidate to benefit from a belated first try over the sprinting distance. With a rating of 124, he’ll head the Timeform figures going into the July Cup, so any improvement for this new challenge will leave him at least jointly-heading the European sprint division.

So, where is the next top British sprinter coming from? I’m hoping the answer has been in front of us for a while.