Jockey Snapper Sinclair has been having a hard time living down the reputation of his father, a crooked jockey. Patricia Barrington agrees to take custody of Snapper, who was sentenced to one year in the state reformatory for stealing when he was hungry. She does so out of gratitude when she recognized Snapper as the son of the man who helped make her father’s stables successful. After some run-ins with the trainer, Tex Reardon, who likens humans to horses and says “like sire, like colt,” Snapper prevents the sale of a fast but unruly horse called Faithful, and eventually rides him to victory in the Kentucky Derby. Using the pseudonym Fred St. Clair, Snapper has a successful career until he refuses to cooperate with gamblers, who frame him on a charge of attempting to throw a race, and he is suspended from racing in the United States for one year. He takes an offer to race for Sir Oliver Martin in London, and has a successful career there also. But Patricia brings Faithful to London for an important race in which Snapper is also riding a horse for a maharajah, who always places a bet of £1000 for his jockey. When Snapper learns that Patricia has almost been wiped out and needs to win the race to get back on her feet, he is torn between his loyalty to the maharajah and his gratitude to the one person who has shown him kindness.