Thundering Nights gave 12 pounds to the excellent 3-year-old filly Santa Barbara and beat her in the Pretty Polly Stakes on June 27 at The Curragh, and when Thundering Nights tries to win her second straight Group 1 contest, in the Prix Jean Romanet on Sunday at Deauville, she gives weight to no one.

The Group 1 Yorkshire Oaks on Thursday at York Racecourse in England was a Breeders’ Cup Challenge “Win and You’re In” race offering the winner automatic fees-paid entry into the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf at Del Mar.

The connections of the 3-year-old filly who won the Yorkshire Oaks have far grander plans than that race.

Snowfall’s star already shone bright before her performance Thursday, but now she is glowing as brightly as anything in the racing universe.

In the last 12 months, the Australian-based mare Verry Elleegant has won five Group 1 races, finished second in another, and was seventh in the Group 1 Melbourne Cup last November.

She is rightfully the leading contender for Australia’s Horse of the Year for the 2020-21 season, an award that will be announced in October.

Verry Elleegant begins her 2021-22 campaign in Saturday’s Group 1 Winx Stakes at Royal Randwick Racecourse in Sydney, a race she won in 2020.

A consistent campaign at minor tracks in Australia since early July has left the 6-year-old mare Willo Titto the favorite, and 136.6-pound topweight, in Friday’s Murwillumbah Cup at Murwillumbah Racecourse.

Trained by Michael Costa, Willo Titto was third in a seven-furlong handicap at Grafton Racecourse on July 8, won a handicap at about a mile at Doomben Racecourse on July 24, and was third by less than a half-length in the Coffs Harbour Cup at Coffs Harbour on Aug. 5.

Wesley Ward has been saying all season that Golden Pal might turn out to be the best horse he’s ever trained, but Golden Pal as of Wednesday wasn’t even the antepost favorite for Friday’s Group 1 Nunthorpe Stakes over five furlongs at York.

Mishriff is fully back on track, but the Love train has gone off the tracks.

Winner of the Saudi Cup in February and the Sheema Classic in March, an extraordinary dirt-turf double, Mishriff had been third upon returning to England in the July 3 Eclipse at Sandown, improving to finish second behind star 3-year-old Adayar while giving weight in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. Wednesday at York, he put on a show in the Group 1 Juddmonte International, storming to the lead with more than a quarter-mile to race and coming home a six-length winner.

As amazing as Love looked as a 3-year-old filly of 2020 for trainer Aidan O’Brien and Coolmore, Snowfall, the 2021 model, might have been better.

Love, defeated in her second start this season at age 4, her first loss since 2019, tries to make amends Wednesday at York in the Juddmonte International. She had not been scheduled to start in that race until St Mark’s Basilica, O’Brien and Coolmore’s standout 3-year-old colt, suffered an unspecified setback that precluded an international start.

Kukeracha ended an early 2021 campaign with a win in the Group 1 Queensland Derby at Eagle Farm Racecourse in Brisbane, Australia, on May 29, a first stakes win and a career milestone by any measure.

For his first start in the second half of the year, the New Zealand-bred Kukeracha will be favored to win Thursday’s Rowley Mile at Hawkesbury Racecourse, if he can beat stablemate Order Again.

Both are trained by Chris Waller, who has entered three of the 15 runners in the field, including the outsider Tory Joy.

Last November, Dream Runner was pulled up in the final furlong of a sprint handicap at Hawkesbury Racecourse in Australia when the gelding was found to have bled.

The incident marked the end of an otherwise successful 2020 campaign of three wins in his first four starts. Dream Runner returned to racing in June and won in his fourth race of the season in a handicap at 1 1/8 miles at Royal Randwick Racecourse in Sydney on Aug. 7.

Mishriff and Love are the heavyweights in the Group 1 Juddmonte International Stakes on Wednesday at York Racecourse in England, but there is more to this important 1 1/4-mile fixture than just those two horses.