Call it being blinded by science, baffled by veterinary terminology or just plain information overload, how many of you went cold on Sun Jewellery in Sunday’s Hong Kong Classic Mile because of his apparent status as a “roarer”?

Come on, hands up, it can’t just have been because of barrier 14 and a slight distance query that Sun Jewellery was allowed to go around at close to double figure odds.

First, for all of you who are blissfully unaware of what a roarer is - probably the same people who thought Sun Jewellery’s price was too good to be true and actually backed the John Size-trained winner - it is an affliction know as laryngeal paralysis.

As the scientific name suggests, the relatively common ailment is due to progressive paralysis in the throat, usually the left side, which results in breathing difficulties as the airways become partially blocked under duress.

And as the more commonly used name suggests - roarer - horses suffering from the “neurogenic atrophy of the laryngeal musculature” make a “noise” when put under pressure. It varies from a slight whistle or wheeze to a full-blown roar - like sticking a playing card in the front spokes of your old bicycle.

Sun Jewellery is one of 31 horses listed as a “roarer” on the extensive Jockey Club database but the only noise the John Size-trained gelding was making, as far as we know, on Sunday wasn’t coming from his throat, it was a “whoosh” sound as he glided away from his rivals in the Group One.

It’s interesting to know a horse is a roarer, but what can you do with the information? Especially when it doesn’t come with a grading or detailed explanation.

Sun Jewellery has won seven from eight since he turned three and as Size said pre-race of the horse, which had already been diagnosed with the condition in Australia: “It didn’t bother him there and hasn’t come against him here either. It might one day, but it hasn’t yet.”

It was a big day for the roarers with Paul O’Sullivan’s Line Seeker, one of 14 horses to have undergone “tie back” surgery for the condition, scoring an impressive win first-up after the procedure, a week after David Hall’s Master Kochanwong, who hasn’t had surgery, wheezed his way to a courageous dirt win.

Both Line Seeker and Master Kochanwong have been diagnosed as being on the serious end of the scale and are thus given a grading of four out of five, although that isn’t listed on the official database. For some, nothing will stop a horse competing. For others, like ironically named underachiever Hear The Roar, it’s a barrier they are not willing to run through and they stay stationed in the lower grades.

Behind Sun Jewellery and runner-up Werther, the 2016 BMW Hong Kong Derby plot thickened, or thinned, as it were.

A number of possible contenders dropped away with subpar runs in the first of the four-year-old series and Sun Jewellery was one of few whose stock rose with his tough performance.

Werther’s run was a great Derby trial and John Moore’s horse could be considered unlucky after being held up for a run. There are no distance concerns with the Queensland Derby runner-up.

Still, when it comes to who produced the run of the race and the best guide going into the Hong Kong Classic Cup on February 21, Sun Jewellery was still the one to follow.

He worked early, sat deep throughout and still had a kick late to repel his rival who was given a perfect ride from Hugh Bowman, until Ryan Moore shut the gate on him with 200m to go.

Regardless of the horses that press on to the Derby, it looks as though the overall legacy of this season’s four-year-old crop could be a bolstering of the sprint division - a group that has looked shallow in recent seasons.

It’s an age group that has already given us Amazing Kids, Strathmore and Fabulous One; eventually Blizzard, who ran home strongly on Sunday, and Lucky Bubbles will join that trio as smart sprinters of the future. It’s a group that almost warrants a “Hong Kong Classic Sprint”.

Where does vanquished favourite Thewizardofoz fit into all of this? Does Size step him up with blinkers off?

It’s not like Thewizardofoz overraced, he just didn’t see the trip. Taking the headgear off may not make much difference anyway, especially how poorly he ran sans blinkers in a Happy Valley trial last month.

Until then we have a couple of Group Ones to assess - Sunday’s Centenary Sprint Cup and Stewards’ Cup - with both races sure to have form students dusting off some veterinary manuals.

Aerovelocity and Luger head into the big races coming off heart irregularities. Now, how do you factor that mysterious condition into selections?