Recent years have seen few upset results in the G1 Yorkshire Oaks. For example superstar Enable enhanced her massive popularity by winning it in 2017 and 2019, and Love added to her G1 winning spree last year.

And it will be a big shock on Thursday if the commentator is not describing Snowfall’s winning surge up the long York straight in this famous 2371m encounter between three-year-olds and upwards fillies and mares.

Snowfall’s trainer Aidan O’Brien is having another extraordinary season and the 51-year-old Irishman has won seven of the 12 European Classics for three-year-olds in England, Ireland and France. All significant but  most observers would surely name Snowfall’s victory in Oaks (2405m) at Epsom and the Irish Oaks (2400m) at The Curragh as the most striking.

At Epsom in June a wide-open looking Classic turned into a one-horse show as the daughter of the late Deep Impact thumped her 13 rivals, the winning margin under Frankie Dettori being a record-breaking 16L.

The ground was faster at The Curragh the following month but the outcome was similar as she accelerated clear – the nearest of her seven rivals 8.5L distant – after which the Yorkshire Oaks was immediately announced as her next target. And Thursday’s venue will not be strange to Snowfall having initiated her remarkable season with victory in May’s G3 Musidora Stakes (2051m) on the Knavesmire track.

One gets the impression that even the great Ballydoyle-based trainer is surprised at the speed of Snowfall’s ascent to the top but he continually describes her as ‘special.’ So can any of her rivals disrupt her agenda on Thursday?

Alpinista was second to Love in last year’s race, has won all three starts this season and bagged her first G1 just 11 days before this York assignment when winning the Grosser Preis Von Berlin (2400m) at Hoppegarten.

The four-year-old daughter of Frankel is trained by Newmarket legend Sir Mark Prescott and he will be hoping that jockey Luke Morris can ride as canny a race at York as he did in Germany. Prescott, who recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of his first winner, reflected: “I thought Luke rode an excellent race. Alpinista was first of the principals to come under pressure, and Luke then made life difficult for the favourite (Torquator Tasso) as they turned for home which I was delighted to see. And then the filly’s stamina really kicked in. She stays well, doesn’t she,” the trainer says as he enjoyably describes Alpinista’s 2.5L victory in one of Germany’s top races.

An even bigger threat to Snowfall could come from Wonderful Tonight, who is expected to compete if the ground is not fast. Unbeaten in two G1’s and two G2’s on her last four  starts she is trained by rising star David Menuisier who admits that he told the fillies’ owner Christopher Wright that the daughter of Le Havre couldn’t win the G2 Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot on the four-year-old’s 2021 return as she was only between 80-85% fit.

In the event Wonderful Tonight was one of the most impressive winners of the meeting. “That day she showed a turn of foot that she had never really shown before, and she has become more flexible. Last year she was always up near the front but now we know she can settle in behind and quicken. She is no one trick pony any more.”