Free spirit relishing chance to express himself on Alpha Centauri

As Alpha Centauri soared by the Ascot winning post in the Coronation Stakes, most of us were blown away at the sight of something very rare. Unprecedented, even.

In stopping the clock at 1min 35.89sec, the imposing grey ran 1.3sec faster over the new mile round course than any horse had done before. No filly in recent times had won the Group 1 by further than her six-length margin of victory and she was also Jessica Harrington’s first winner at the royal meeting.

There was an immediate and inescapable sense that a star had been born. However, as her annihilation of a high-class Group 1 field was completed so gloriously, something else relatively innocuous also struck as being out of the ordinary.