Read an extract from Timeform's Horses To Follow for the 2025 Flat season that focuses on handicapper Patrick Jupp's selection Harper's Ferry.
Sky Lantern and Talent were the classic-winning fillies of 2013, the former winning the 1000 Guineas and the latter winning the Oaks as well as finishing runner-up in the St Leger. The pair never met on the track, with Sky Lantern kept to a mile and Talent running over longer trips but, 11 years later, their three-year-old sons fought out the finish in a class 3 handicap over a mile at Doncaster in October. In finishing clear of the rest, both Harper’s Ferry and Midnight Gun put up very useful performances which means both make appeal for top-end handicaps this year or maybe even pattern company.
It was Talent’s son Harper’s Ferry who came out on top by a length at Doncaster where he was running over a mile for the first time since a narrow defeat on his Newmarket debut exactly a year earlier. Without the tongue strap he’d worn for his two previous starts, Harper’s Ferry made all the running and found plenty when tackled by Midnight Gun to assert in the last half-furlong, showing plenty of improvement for the drop back in trip.
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Given his pedigree, though, it was understandable that Harper’s Ferry should have been campaigned over middle distances for most of the season. He shaped well when second on his reappearance at Doncaster in March and then landed the odds with something to spare in a novice at Windsor the following month.
An initial bid to step Harper’s Ferry up in class was thwarted when he refused to enter the stalls for the Dee Stakes at Chester, and when he did appear next it was in a higher grade still in the King Edward VII Stakes at Royal Ascot. He wasn’t up to what proved a very stiff task in a race won by high-class French gelding Calandagan whilst also shaping as though the step up to a mile and a half was against him after failing to settle fully.
Given a break until the autumn, Harper’s Ferry had his sights lowered to handicap company for his last couple of starts at Doncaster. He was dropped back to a mile and a quarter and sent off favourite for a contest at the St Leger meeting but raced much too freely, prompting the further drop back to a mile for his final start and that’s where his future lies this season. He acts on heavy ground. Ed Walker
Patrick Jupp's analysis: “Harper’s Ferry ended his three-year-old season on a high, beating another regally-bred rival in what looks a strong Doncaster handicap, and in the process gave a hint as to what we can expect from him as a four-year-old. After a middle-distance campaign when his keen-going nature held him back, it was the drop back to a mile that proved the making of him. He looks sure to do better still in 2025 now that connections have found the key to him and will be interesting in top-end handicaps, starting with a return to Doncaster for the Lincoln.”
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