Racing - Henderson weighs up next step for Shishkin

Trainer in hurry to geta run into horse before King George V Chase following high-profile refusal to start

- Greg Wood

Royale Pagaille was a worthy winner of the first Grade One race of the new British jumps season on Saturday but the abiding image of the weekend was of Shishkin, the 8-13 favourite, planted at a right-angle to the running rail at Ascot as the other three runners in the 1965 Chase galloped off into the distance.

Shishkin was the future once, and not that long ago. Having fallen at the second flight on his British hurdling debut in December 2019, he racked up a 10-race winning sequence that included novice events over both hurdles and fences at the Cheltenham Festival and, in January 2022, a one-length defeat of Energumene in the Clarence House at Ascot that was an instant classic of the winter game.

Even in his near-unbeatable early pomp, however, there were occasional signs of a quirk or two, including the "flat spot" in several races that seemed to mark the point where Shishkin weighed up whether he had done as much as necessary for one afternoon. And while his courage made all the difference in that extraordinary race at Ascot, a 2-6 record since suggests the effort of running down one of the best two-milers of recent years, having jumped the last with two lengths to find, took him to a place he does not want to revisit.