Key events
Princess of Wales pulls out of Royal Ascot at last minute
So the announcement of the royal procession has resulted in an actual news story as the original list of those travelling in the carriages has been amended and the Princess of Wales has withdrawn from attending Royal Ascot, apparently at the last minute. It must have been so as the first draft of those in the carriages was sent to journalists at 12.03pm and then news started to emerge about a quarter of an hour later that she would not be at the races this afternoon.
Kensington Palace has reportedly declined to comment on the decision, but royal correspondents are reporting that the Princess of Wales is understood to be “disappointed” at not being able to be at the meeting with her husband and the King and Queen but “has to find the right balance” on returning to full-time duty.
Greg Wood
4.20pm PRINCE OF WALES’S STAKES preview
The first piece of recent form to consider in Wednesday’s feature event is undoubtedly the Group One Tattersalls Gold Cup at the Curragh last month, when Los Angeles beat Anmaat, last year’s surprise Champion Stakes winner over today’s track and trip, by half a length. The bare form, though, tells only half the story, as Anmaat, who was making his seasonal debut against a race-fit Los Angeles, travelled like the best horse in the race for much of the way and traded at 1-9 in running on Betfair when he ranged alongside inside the final furlong. Owen Burrows’s gelding was outstayed to the line, but with the race under his belt and back at the scene of his biggest win to date, it would be no surprise at all to see him reverse the form. Even that might not be enough to get the win, though, as See The Fire is a fascinating late addition to the field via a supplementary entry. Andrew Balding’s filly put up a much-improved performance in the Middleton Stakes at York in May, scooting a dozen lengths clear after scything through the pack on the bit. The visual impression was backed up by a strong time and she is a serious contender to get a first Group One win on the board. French raider Map Of Stars is another runner without a Group One win as yet, but the top-class Sosie, the current favourite for the Arc in October, got first run on him in the Prix Ganay last time and he was finishing best of all. Ombudsman too is in with a big shout, despite losing his unbeaten record when second to Almaqam in the Brigadier Gerard Stakes at Sandown last time, and even the 25-1 shot Facteur Cheval would have a squeak on his best form. Jerome Reynier’s gelding won the Dubai Turf at Meydan in 2024 and was not far away when sixth in the same race in early April.
KEY FORM:
Tattersalls Gold Cup, the Curragh, 25 May 25 (Los Angeles, Anmaat).
https://youtu.be/Nm__cQjBTGY?feature=shared
Prix Ganay, Longchamp, 27 Apr 25 (Map Of Stars).
https://youtu.be/42SlamCZsP0?feature=shared
Champion Stakes, Ascot, 19 Oct 24 (Anmaat, Los Angeles).
https://youtu.be/0QXdf7zGexw?feature=shared
Middleton Stakes, York, 15 May 25 (See The Fire).
https://youtu.be/LfTuXh8vMKo?feature=shared
Brigadier Gerard Stakes, Sandown, 29 May 25 (Ombudsman).
https://youtu.be/S68WsLHK1Fk?si=MlwLBx2NjnYKmBiF
Dubai Turf, Meydan, 30 Mar 24 (Facteur Cheval).
https://youtu.be/UK9A05xfOd8?si=ViTJMEjPBDpTQJza
SELECTION: SEE THE FIRE
Queen’s Hat Stakes 2pm
Our regular reader will be well aware we always have the first betting heat, a fashion one, before the racing gets underway. What colour will Camilla’s hat be today after a mint green titfer yesterday by Philip Treacy which I thought was blue!
William Hill are betting on the heat with the odds as follows:
9-4 Blue, 3-1 Pink, 5-1 Yellow, 13-2 White, 12-1 Green, 14-1 Brown, Orange, Purple, 16-1 Red, Grey, 25-1 Black.
Royal Procession Stakes, 2pm
Here are the runners and riders in the carriages coming down the track in two hours’ time:
1st Carriage
The King
The Queen
Prince Saud bin Khalid Al-Saud
The Rt. Hon. The Lord Soames of Fletching
2nd Carriage
The Prince of Wales
The Princess of Wales
Mr. Justin Rose
Mrs. Justin Rose
3rd Carriage
The Duke of Gloucester
The Duchess of Gloucester
The Earl of Halifax
The Countess of Halifax
4th Carriage
The Lady Sarah Chatto
Mr. Daniel Chatto
Mr. Robert Harris
Mrs. Robert Harris
The Prince and Princess of Wales turn up on the day of the race named after him which is becoming a regular ocurrence. Some interesting guests there … golfer Justin Rose and the novelist Robert Harris, author of Conclave and ex of the Observer, ex of our stable.
Meanwhile, the Ephraim Hardcastle column. in the Daily Mail pointed out this morning that “Prince Andrew’s public banishment continued on Tuesday with his non-appearance at Royal Ascot. At least the disgraced Duke was invited to the Windsor Castle lunch before the King, Queen and other royals took part in the carriage procession to the nearby course. My mole whispers that Andrew is sometimes on hand to help entertain guests, especially on days when other royals are thin on the ground, although dressed in his best bib and tucker he isn’t allowed to join them on the course.”
Would be fascinating to be a fly on the wall when Harris and Prince Andrew met!
Greg Wood
3.40pm DUKE OF CAMBRIDGE STAKES preview
Just eight runners for this fillies’ and mares’ Group Two, but every last one of them has at least a snippet of form somewhere that a decent lawyer could build a case around. The obvious candidates are Cinderella’s Dream, who took the Group Two Dahlia Stakes with ease last time but carries a 3lb penalty as a result, and Fallen Angel, last season’s Irish 1,000 Guineas winner, who was sixth on her return to action in the Lockinge Stakes at Newbury but went off at 20-1 and surely needed the race. Her fine efforts in defeat in the Group One Matron Stakes at the Curragh and then the Prix de l’Opera at Longchamp on Arc weekend in October make her a major player. She is not the only Classic winner in today’s field as Elmaka will attempt to register a first success since edging a blanket finish to the 1,000 Guineas at Newmarket last season, although she was handed a comprehensive beating by Cinderella’s Dream in the Dahlia.
SELECTION: CINDERELLA’S DREAM
Greg Wood
3.05pm QUEEN’S VASE preview
The first significant three-year-old race of the season at a mile and three-quarters, and while Carmers took the Yeats Stakes at Navan in May over a furlong shorter, every other runner is stepping up at least two furlongs in trip. Many are likely to post a new career-best as a result, including Aidan O’Brien’s Shackleton, a son of Camelot who was fourth of five on his return to action over 10 furlongs at the Curragh but was stopped in his run and looked sure to improve for a step up in trip. Roger Varian’s Rahiebb comes in with a fairly similar profile to the trainer’s Eldar Eldarov, who landed this in 2022 and went on to win the St Leger, while Asmarani, a product of the late Aga Khan IV’s breeding operation whose pedigree is laden with stamina, is another very interesting contender for Francis-Henri Graffard. He was runner-up to a next-time winner in the Group Three Prix Hocquart at Longchamp in May, is second-in on Timeform ratings on that form and is almost certain to find plenty more now that he goes beyond a mile-and-a-half. Devil’s Advocate, whose dam was a winner at this trip, was fourth in the Dante at York and is another to consider along with O’Brien’s second-string Scandinavia, a maiden winner by Justify out of a Galileo mare, in what looks, on paper at least, to be a cracking renewal of this race.
SELECTION: ASMARANI
Greg Wood
2.30pm QUEEN MARY STAKES preview
Royal Ascot provides all manner of different challenges for form students and the task here is to identify the winner in a big field of juvenile fillies that – with the exception of a couple of rank outsiders – have all had either one, two or no races at all. Judging the relative merits of lightly-raced two-year-olds is a tricky puzzle that tends to involve a lot of trial and error, but there has been little doubt that Karl Burke’s Zelaina would set off as the favourite for this race since she all the running to win a maiden at Nottingham earlier this month by nearly three lengths. She cost £650k at the breeze-ups earlier this year and was still showing signs of inexperience at Nottingham, so she can be expected to improve significantly for the run (Timeform added a capital “P” to her rating, suggesting that she is open to much more than normal improvement, and they don’t hand those out willy-nilly). Wesley Ward has sent four winners of this race over from his base in the United States, and while he is missing from the meeting this year, there is a still an American presence thanks to Patrick Biancone’s Lennilu. Biancone won consecutive Arcs in 1983 and 1984 with All Along and Sagace, but has now been training in the States for more than two decades.
Lennilu qualified to run via the Royal Palm Juvenile Fillies at Gulfstream, which you can watch – with commentary in Spanish, as it’s the only one I could find – here, and Timeform were sufficiently impressed by that run to make her their second-top runner in the race on ratings behind Aidan O’Brien’s True Love. Lennilu’s work rider and groom for the trip, incidentally, will be the trainer’s daughter, Andie, whose main job is as a reporter and analyst on the American racing channel, FanDuel TV. True Love, meanwhile, had her form behind stable-companion Gstaad at Navan in May seriously boosted on Tuesday when Gstaad ran out a comfortable winner of the Coventry Stakes. A raft of other contenders with a single run and win to their name include Spicy Marg and Staya, and while Spicy Marg took a Newmarket novice that has produced two Royal Ascot winners in the last three years, Staya also put up a taking performance in her Yarmouth maiden. She travelled well, eased through towards the lead, quickened when required and clocked a decent time for a debutant, so a price of around 16-1 is a fair each-way option in an open race.
SELECTION: STAYA
Here’s the run down of the action today and I will start posting Greg Wood’s previews to give you a chance to study the form:
2.30pm – The Queen Mary Stakes (5f)
3.05pm – The Queen’s Vase (1m 6f)
3.40pm – The Duke of Cambridge Stakes (1m)
4.20pm – The Prince of Wales’s Stakes (1m 2f)
5.00pm – The Royal Hunt Cup (Heritage Handicap) (1m)
5.35pm – The Kensington Palace Stakes (Handicap) (1m)
6.10pm – The Windsor Castle Stakes (5f)
Rub these names out on your racecards. These are the horses that won’t be turning up this afternoon along with their sick notes!
2.30pm Queen Mary Stakes
6 Eternal Solace (not eaten up)
4.20pm Prince Of Wales’s Stakes
2 Certain Lad (going not suitable)
5.35pm Kensington Palace Stakes
20 Queen Of Atlantis (bad scope)
6.10pm Windsor Castle Stakes
13 Kansas (not eaten up)
Good morning. It’s sweltering already as I’m sure you’ve noticed and it’s only going to get hotter so as advised yesterday there’s going to be no major change in the ground conditions out on the track.
The official going for day two at Royal Ascot is Good to Firm, good in places.
GoingStick readings at 8.30am:
Stands’ side: 8.5
Centre: 8.6
Far side: 8.5
Round course: 7.4
Preamble
Greg Wood
Good morning from Ascot on day two of the 2025 Royal meeting on what promises to be another scorcher of a day, both on and off the track.
There is only one Group One event on the card – the Prince of Wales’s Stakes in the traditional primetime slot at 4.20pm (all times BST) – but it is an ultra-competitive renewal with no fewer than five of the runners priced up between 9-4 and 11-2 or shorter.
A trio of Group Twos take us up to the feature, ranging from two-year-old fillies blitzing down the straight course in the Queen Mary Stakes (2.30pm) to three-year-old stayers and St Leger candidates in the Queen’s Vase. And the late afternoon action includes the Royal Hunt Cup, one of the most competitive handicaps of the year, and the added bonus of a royal runner with a big chance as Rainbows Edge goes to post in the purple and scarlet silks for the Kensington Palace Stakes at 5.35pm.
Five millimetres of water on both the straight and round courses overnight has maintained the going as good to firm, good in places, although it is sure to be getting faster as the day unfolds.
In the jockey and trainer standings, Ryan Moore remains odds-on to be the week’s leading rider at around 4-7 but James Doyle, who rode the last two winners on the opening day, is now down to 15-8 (from an opening 5-1) with William Buick, who remains winnerless, is out to around 10-1. Fallen Angel, in the Duke Of Cambridge Stakes, and Map Of Stars, in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes, are Doyle’s major hopes today, while all four of Moore’s rides on the card – True Love (2.30pm), Shackleton (3.05pm), Los Angeles (4.20pm) and The Liffey (5pm) – are currently either favourite or second-favourite for their races.
A report on yesterday’s action with a quick stroll through today’s card is here, more detailed previews of today’s seven races are on the way, and all the latest news, betting moves, results, quotes and more will be here on the live blog throughout the day.
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