Hamad, from a family of racehorse trainers, has been an all-round horseman since childhood and participated in showjumping in his youth. He began training in Qatar in 2013 with just three horses, saddled his first winner the following year, and then went from strength to strength. He finished the 2023-2024 season as Qatar’s leading trainer by number of winners with 59. His first horse for Wathnan was Make Me King – unsuccessful in the Middle East over the winter but a headline horse for Hamad in Europe – and his first winner in our peacock blue and old gold silks was Haunted Dream in a Doha Group 3 event. His second was Jeff Koons in the Qatar Derby – a huge win made even more memorable as fellow Qatari Faleh Bughenaim was in the saddle. Hamad arrived at Newmarket in the spring of 2024 with a small string of horses owned by Wathnan Racing. He celebrated his first winner on British soil on 29 June with Make Me King, who went on to become his first European Group race winner, at Deauville in August. Haunted Dream, second in the Wolferton Stakes at Royal Ascot, gave Hamad his biggest British win of his first season in the Bentinck Stakes at the Qatar-sponsored Glorious Goodwood festival.