'The form reads with crystal clarity' - assessing Alpinista's European victories

When Alpinista chased home Love in the Darley Yorkshire Oaks two years ago there were barely any locals to see the race owing to Covid-19 restrictions.

By dint of the campaign mapped out by her owner-breeder Kirsten Rausing and trainer Sir Mark Prescott, there will be plenty on the Knavesmire who are not much wiser as to the merit of the striking grey daughter of Frankel, even though she has a string of 1s next to her name, the last four of them earned in Group 1 company.

Last summer Alpinista backed up her most recent domestic win in the Lancashire Oaks with a trip to Berlin's Hoppegarten, where she defeated the previous year's Deutsches Derby runner-up Torquator Tasso by two and three-quarter lengths in the Grosser Preis von Berlin.