Century the main aim as yard starts with biggest-ever contingent

After his best season in prize-money terms at home, Andrew Balding has every reason for a positive outlook as he considers the 2018 campaign. With Leicester City chairman Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha's King Power Racing now firmly ensconced with 30 horses including potential stable star Beat The Bank, for whom Group 1s are the obvious target, the Kingsclere trainer has his biggest-ever string ready for action.

"A yard of our size should be getting a minimum of 100 winners which we failed to do last year and we're determined to put it right this year, but obviously quality is important as well and it didn't really matter last year because we won our share of nice prizes," he says.

Balding has made a good fist of the all-weather over the winter with 17 winners at a notable strike-rate of 23 per cent. "I think we're behind where we'd usually be," he says. "Everyone's suffered the same with the weather, which has been quite restrictive of late, but the ones we've been running have been encouraging."