He was bred by the Hertfordshire-based Newsells Park Stud, and was sent as a yearling at Deauville Sales in August 2009 where he was sold for €260,000 to Jeremy Brummitt, the racing manager of Bjorn Nielsen.

[4] Masked Marvel then moved into Classic contention by beating Namibian by three lengths in the Cocked Hat Stakes,[5] after which he was offered at 33–1 for the Derby.

[4] In the Derby he failed to cope with Epsom - Gosden described him as being "confused"[6] by the course- and finished eighth of the thirteen runners, beaten just under nine lengths by Pour Moi.

[7] A month later, Masked Marvel re-appeared in the Bahrain Trophy at Newmarket, where he held off Census by a head in a tight finish to record his first Group race win.

Masked Marvel passed the Ballydoyle contender Seville two furlongs from home, opened up a clear lead, and stayed on strongly to win by three lengths from Brown Panther and Sea Moon in a race record time of 3:00.44.