Ask anyone how their Royal Ascot 2025 was and you’ll pretty much get the same answer, writes David Massey. Hot. It was hot. Hot and sticky. Humid and sticky. Hot, and humid, and sticky. Perm any two from three, basically. We’ll come to that in a while but there’s no sign of that heat in my lovely air-conditioned car as I drive down to Windsor on Monday.
I go at 11am, to try and arrive around half three and meet up with Jason at our digs for the week. We’re staying near Bracknell, at Harman’s Water, which sounds like something you might treat with antibiotics. Having lost two Ascot Airbnb’s in the past couple of months (“twirled”, in bookmaking parlance - you book it early, then nearer the time you’re informed there’s a problem with your house, often something spurious and you know EXACTLY what’s actually happened, you’ve been gazumped by someone offering more money) we’re grateful to have somewhere to stay.
I arrive five minutes before Jason does and get the keys from the lockbox outside. Having opened the door and put the keys on the kitchen side, I start getting my gear in. There’s a room with two single beds which I’ll happily have, then Jason arrives. He starts getting his stuff in too, but as he goes to get his second lot of stuff, closes the door behind him.
It locks automatically.
I look at Jason and Jason looks at me, not realising what he’s done. Panic sets in as I try the door; it won’t open. I can see the keys on the kitchen side through the window but it’s no use, we’re stuffed. It’s taken us precisely four minutes to make our first error of the week.
Jason rings the property owner. He lives in Essex, it turns out, so can’t exactly drop the spare keys off, but he has someone local that does have a spare set. Unfortunately for us, he’s uncontactable until after 6pm, so there’s nothing we can do at this point except head down to Windsor, and get the keys later.
Windsor is full of bookmakers on a jolly night out, and I’m doing the Trackside service for a select few that have taken it for the evening. It’s nice to catch up with a few familiar faces I haven’t seen for a while, including a couple from abroad who come here for the week. This is the first time I’ve not worked for a bookmaker on Ascot week, choosing instead to help Vicki run Trackside. She’s more than capable of doing it on her own, in truth, but the bigger handicaps could use a helping hand, plus she’s other bits and pieces to write up and when that happens I can take over for a while. Come the winter and I’ll be more in the driving seat but Vicki steers on the level.
Having got the keys back (and this time split them up, one now safely attached to my keyring) we get into the digs properly and have a look round. It’s a pretty sparse Airbnb, there’s not much here. Neither has the back grass been cut for a few months. It’s the bare minimum of crockery in the cupboards, there’s hardly a mirror in the place, the TV doesn’t appear to have had any channels loaded onto it. There’s not even a toaster. The lamps in the bedrooms are the flimsiest of things that would go over in a good gust of wind; essentially, this is a student house with four bedrooms.
Thankfully I’ve brought my own fan down which I purchased only that morning from Argos and that at least enables me to get a decent night’s sleep. (It’ll turn out to be the best thirty quid I spend all week.)
The heat is already rising as I drive into Ascot on Tuesday. I try to arrive for around half eight - as many of you know, my first piece of work needs to be in by around half nine for the Life each day, and before that there’s the morning chat with Mr Delargy. It ought to take ten minutes but we’ll inevitably get sidetracked by something else and lose the thread at some point. I’m working in the middle of the track, in the media marquee near the winning post. It at least has a couple of air conditioning units, but is, in the words of one of the bookies reps, “like working in a massive cannabis farm.” I know what he means, not from personal experience you understand. I’ve also access, this year, to the media centre, which is by the paddock. I decide to give that a go Tuesday afternoon, but after a few hours in there, packed in like sardines in thirty degree heat, I decide the cannabis farm, rather than a sauna for battery chickens, is the better option for the rest of the week.
Those that read the Trackside columns will know I’ve been banging on about Docklands winning the Queen Anne since the Diomed, and he gets a right roar from me as he prevails by the narrowest of margins. It might only be race 1, day 1, but that almost ensures a decent Royal Ascot for your scribe, having backed it ante-post as well. I celebrate with a bottle of sparkling water. (Even by this point, those poor lads and lasses that are constantly restocking the fridges with water for us have given up trying to make it look neat by taking it out the plastic outer casing, preferring instead to throw packs of 24 in there and let us fight like caged tigers for them. It isn’t pretty, but it’s effective.)
Each day, before the Royal Parade arrives, you have to decide where you want to be, because at around 1.50 everything gets locked down, all gates are closed, and you have to stay where you are for about 30 minutes. Needless to say, I disappear off to the pre-parade ring nice and early each day, for two reasons; one, it’s obviously the best place for a first glance of the horses as they come in, and two, and arguably more importantly this week, there’s a lot of shade to hide away in up there. On the Thursday I’ve gone particularly early, around 1.20, well over an hour before the first, and unsurprisingly there’s nobody around. I’ve the pre-parade ring to myself until, from nowhere, a sunglasses-wearing figure appears, on his own. It’s Aidan O’Brien.
Aidan, as meticulous as he is, comes up each day to check the box he uses is spot on, that there’s water there for the staff, that everything is in its place. And here’s my chance to say hello to greatness himself. He finishes off his little jobs and walks toward where I’m standing. I wish him well for the day, and that he has luck on his side (like he needs it…). He puts his hand on my shoulder, thanks me for my kindness, and shakes my hand. I’m never washing this hand again. Charles Darwin then goes and wins the Norfolk, and clearly my wishing him luck played a huge part in that. Clearly.
That stay-where-you-are Royal Parade policy creates havoc for a couple of days. Some trainers and owners are caught behind a gate next to the pre-parade ring and aren’t being released as the horses go through to the parade ring. There’s a lot of angry trainers that want to be with their horses but the gate staff stand firm. Once released, it creates a huge bottleneck of connections trying to get into the parade ring (you have to use the walkway, not the horsewalk) and many trainers and owners simply give up, and use the horsewalk instead. The sight of just one attendant, arms spread wide open, trying to turn back a mob, Canute-like, has to be one of the most comedic images of the week. By Thursday this policy has been relaxed, and rightly so.
More on our digs. Rob, the bookmaker I’m staying with this week, comes back on Tuesday night. Let me add, at this point, Rob, and his partner Vanessa, who will be joining us later in the week, were in Vegas the previous week, staying at the Venetian. Now, it’s fair to say our digs are more menace than Venice, but Rob’s main concern is that he can’t find the remote for the telly. I tell him it’s a waste of time, as there’s no terrestrial channels on it, but he hunts down the remote, and finds a film on Netflix to watch instead. He’s asleep within ten minutes of putting it on. Rob can just about stomach the house - “it’s a bit basic, isn’t it?” - but I can’t wait to see what Vanessa makes of it. She’s going to hit the roof when she gets here on Thursday. I’m off to bed at ten, but the fan doesn’t work. It worked perfectly well last night, so what’s the issue? I have a look at the plug and only have to touch it to hear the whole socket fizzing and buzzing. Yep, the socket’s knackered. Add that to the ever-growing list of grumbles with this place.
I’ve already had a catch-up with my Australian bookmaker friend Erin, who comes over for Ascot each year to stand with the Rob Waterhouse crew, but that doesn’t stop me finding her again on Thursday. We have a good chat about the differences between British and Aussie bookmakers, which I always find interesting, before she asks me if I know anyone that might have some change going spare? They’ve already eaten into their stash. I hunt around and come up with a couple of hundred quids' worth, with the promise of some more tomorrow and Saturday if they need it. Erin, very grateful, promises me dinner next year as a thank you. Dinner with a gorgeous young lady, you say? It’s already in the diary, set in stone.
Back to some of the racing. Merchant is another nice winner for me on the week (and how good does that form look after runner-up Serious Contender pushed Lambourn all the way in the Irish Derby at the weekend) and Trawlerman, well, plenty of you probably saw the video I did with a certain Simon Nott that morning. I thought he was the bet of the week, and so it proved. Ascot is normally a tough week for me, but I’m nicely in front, and so it seems are most of the punters on the Thursday, with the bookmakers having to be carried out on stretchers after five winning favourites on the day. “Black armbands, gentleman”, as one bookie is heard to remark as he leaves the track.
Thursday night, and with Liam and Heather, who will be working for Rob the next two days, joining myself and Rob in the digs, they all decide to go down the pub to eat, whereas I’ve work to do, and have bought myself a microwave meal for one from Morrisons. (One of the many, many joys of working on the road.) I’m beavering away when the phone goes. It’s Rob, in the pub.
“Vanessa’s just arrived, but she says she can’t find the house. Can you ring her and direct her in?”. I’ve just realised - the crafty sods have all disappeared down the pub to leave me with Vanessa’s ire. I ring Vanessa and she’s just in the wrong part of the street. She parks up, gets out the car, looks at the unkempt garden and before I even get a hello, she looks at me and says one word. “Pi**hole.”
I just burst out laughing, as there’s no other reaction at this point. She rings Rob. “You’d better bring some wine back. And good wine, nothing cheap.” Vanessa is, let’s go with underwhelmed, with the place. I love Vanessa to bits, she’s actually from my neck of the woods and so we (literally) have some common ground between us, but I don’t think she’s in a particularly talkative mood at present! I leave her to explore the rest of the house, which takes her all of ten minutes.
Friday, and the heat reaches unbearable. I’d brought two suits along, thinking I’d change into the lighter linen one today, but that idea was abandoned after a day. However, I’m in the pre-parade ring when a fashion faux-pas is pointed out by photographer Debbie. I’ve had this suit three years now and never noticed the flaps are stitched together at the back. “They need releasing”, she says, “you’ll notice the benefits then.” She’s right, and after a bit of cutting using my keys, the airflow around my back is so much better. Three years, and I’ve never noticed. I’m a bit thick like that, sometimes. I can go into minute detail over a 0-100 handicap at Worcester but not spot two flaps stitched together that ought not to be for three years. My brain, like most men's brains, are wired up differently/wrongly (take your pick).
To top the week off, I’ve been playing low six/high six in the big straight-track handicaps all week, just for buttons, to see how I’d come out at the end of the week. By that I mean the lowest six drawn and the highest six drawn, just in case there’s a track bias. High draws seemed in charge for a day or two but that appears to have swung back a little, and when I hit 5p’s worth of the 11k trifecta in the Sandringham, it’ll ensure the best Ascot I’ve had for many a year. It’s almost worth putting up with the unbearable weather.
Friday night is fish’n’chip night at the digs, only when the food arrives we realise this place is not just short of crockery, but cutlery as well. There’s four of us (Liam has disappeared off to the pub to watch the rugby) and this place has - wait for it - only two forks. Thankfully Rob has some plastic cutlery in the van which saves the day, but the lack of utensils tips Vanessa over the edge again, and the not-cheap wine makes a reappearance. After food, Rob puts a film on and falls asleep (after the obligatory ten minutes) and myself, Vanessa and Heather get a pack of cards out. We teach Heather how to play rummy, and she learns quick, winning six of ten hands we play that night. This is actually the most relaxed we’ve been in this place since we got here. Maybe the wine (and my beer) has something to do with it. Or maybe it’s because we’re going home tomorrow.
Saturday, finally. Time to bid adieu, but not before the stifling weather has one more say. We pack up and leave the digs, vowing never to come anywhere near the place again (I think Vanessa has just about stopped short of torching it) and it’s by far my worst punting day of the week, giving a bit of the winnings back. I don’t have enough on the one success I do have, concentrating on the Wokingham instead, and get nowhere near the winner, or indeed places, and the exotics are a waste of time. Don’t worry, we can get it (or should that be Get It?) back on the Stewards Cup when Holkham Bay wins.
And that’s what’s next, Glorious Goodwood. Last year, we sweltered in the heat there, too. The highlight of that week was a dip in the sea at Bognor Regis. God, that felt good. It’s bound to rain this year, isn’t it?
See you all there.
- DM
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Cercene_CoronationStakes2025.png318830David Masseyhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngDavid Massey2025-07-02 09:01:222025-07-02 09:01:22Roving Reports: A Royal Debrief
Connections of Venetian Sun will be dreaming big after she rose admirably to the challenge at Royal Ascot to land the Albany Stakes.
The filly has clearly always been held in high regard by trainer Karl Burke, and demonstrated exactly why when overcoming a difficult draw to take Group Three honours by a length and a half last week.
While there is no great hurry to formulate an immediate plan for the two-year-old daughter of Starman, a handful of races have been identified as possible next targets for the Tony Bloom and Ian McAleavy-owned youngster.
Bloom’s racing manager Sean Graham said: “Karl said she came out of the race in great order.
All smiles for the Venetian Sun team at Royal Ascot (John Walton/PA)
“You’ve Newmarket for the Duchess of Cambridge, which is six furlongs at the July meeting, and you’ve got the Lowther over six furlongs at York. Later in the season you’ve also got the Moyglare over seven furlongs at the Curragh.
“We said to Karl that we’d let the hare sit after Royal Ascot and not be in any mad rush to make any definite decisions, but those races are certainly on our radar.
“If you win the Albany from a dreadful draw you probably have a much better filly still, she had no cover and was on the wide outside – everything went wrong and yet she still won.”
The Guineas was mentioned in the immediate aftermath of the Ascot contest, with all connections singing from the same hymn sheet with regards to Venetian Sun’s potential, while remaining mindful that her three-year-old season is a distant prospect still.
Graham added: “I think most trainers would automatically be thinking about the Guineas with an Albany winner, but her owners are very aware that an awful lot can happen between now and then so we won’t get too ahead of ourselves.”
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/2.80726647-1-scaled.jpg12802560https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.png2025-06-25 10:33:122025-06-25 10:33:12Options aplenty for impressive Albany heroine Venetian Sun
It is not a common occurrence for a horse to start winning Gold Cups at seven – Yeats had two triumphs on his CV by the time he added a third in his seven-year-old season, Drums Taps was defending his title when he won in 1993, so too was Invershin in 1929.
Perhaps Trawlerman was prevented from an earlier success by the other things he clearly had on his mind as a young horse, namely a one-sided feud with the starting stalls that scuppered his chances more than once.
When that score was settled is unknown, but it is clear that with time, patience and expert handling he has developed into the kind of standing-dish stayer associated with Ascot’s oldest race.
The term ‘dour stayer’ usually enters the racing vocabulary in the wettest part of winter when the ground is hock-deep, but it was on rapid going and under a sweltering sun that Trawlerman managed to call the phrase to mind several months out of season.
The 85-40 favourite under William Buick, John and Thady Gosden’s gelding nipped into an early lead and lolloped along at the head of affairs to gain an advantage that only seemed to widen as the race progressed.
When he swung for home and passed the clanging bell there was evidently no blow that could reach him, and it was with consummate ease that he sauntered home seven lengths ahead to break the track record over the trip and take his place at the head of the staying standings.
“We came here today and William was very clear what he was going to do, he was going to set a good, even pace and gradually press them from Swinley Bottom all the way through,” said John Gosden.
“The pretenders – the Aga Khan horse (Candelari) and the Coolmore and Ballydoyle horse (Illinois) – they’d have to stay two and a half miles properly. And they didn’t stay, we took them for stamina.
“It was the plan, beyond the plan, absolutely the plan – and he carried it off to perfection. We spend months planning this, we don’t just think ‘oh, shall we run at Ascot next week?’.
“It’s months in the making and they come here in top order. He’s one of the most relentless, proper gallopers. Going wire to wire in this takes a bit of doing, as does breaking the track record,
“It gives me enormous pleasure, I love the Cup races and I always have done. I’m inclined to run one more race and then put him away and come back next year.
“That’s more important than anything, we’ve won it once now, let’s see if he can win it again.”
Of Trawlerman’s earlier waywardness and his more mannerly approach as an older horse, Gosden added: “He used to be a hooligan, an absolute hooligan!
“Now even I’d ride him, though I don’t suppose he’d particularly appreciate that.
“He’s a fabulous horse to be around, he’s like his father – incredibly brave. Golden Horn would run through a wall for you and this horse is the same.”
Trawlerman has always been a very good horse, but he has not always been a very good boy – now he is both.
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/2.80715736-scaled.jpg12802560https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.png2025-06-19 17:47:382025-06-19 17:47:38Trawlerman comes of age with Gold Cup haul
John and Thady Gosden’s Understudy is unlikely to be so overlooked next time she lines up after finishing second in the Ribblesdale Stakes at Royal Ascot.
Beaten three and a quarter lengths by the far more experienced Garden Of Eden, Understudy proved she was underestimated when a 40-1 chance under Robert Havlin.
The run was only her third racecourse start and a big leap up in class, pointing to plenty more to come from the flashy chestnut daughter of Sea The Stars.
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/2.80714944-scaled.jpg12802560https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.png2025-06-19 17:47:132025-06-19 17:47:13Ascot Eyecatcher will not be an Understudy for long
This week, as part of our Royal Ascot content, I'll be making a suggested placepot permutation each day.
I'll be using the ABCX approach, outlined here, and some online software called Tix which I built in conjunction with Nige, the guy who coded most of the original geegeez.co.uk racecards and form tools. [It is excellent software, though I say so myself]
Basically, I'm creating a number of different placepot bets based around how strongly I fancy various horses; and I'm weighting my stakes accordingly.
When I say 'I', I mean Tix is doing all of that; I'm just picking horses and choosing whether they're A (strongest fancy), B (fair chance) or C (dark horse/lively outsider). X are the horses I'm discarding from contention.
Tix Bonus
Every winning ticket placed through Tix benefits from a 5% bonus return. Win £100? You'll get £105. Win £500? Enjoy an extra £25. Just for placing your bets through Tix.
Prizes to be won
And, because it's Royal Ascot week, we've got some Tix prizes to give away
Tuesday to Friday
For the first four days of the Royal meeting, the Tix player with the highest return on investment on a single ticket will win £50.
Saturday
On the final day of Royal Ascot, the Tix player netting top ROI will win £100, credited to their tote account.
So that's £300 in prizes this week!
What do you need?
You simply need a tote account. Get one here if you don't already have one. [You'll probably be eligible for extra bonuses when signing up, but obviously do check the T's and C's]
**
OK, that's the set up. Let's get to it. The first question is where to go narrow and where to spread out. My inclination was to be narrow in the Group 1's but the Queen Anne and King Charles III are very open, and I hate the 'seven runner with an odds on' feel of the St James's Palace!
Leg 1 - Queen Anne Stakes:
In the end I've opted to bank in the first race and prey (and potentially place lay) for Rosallion. He should improve a ton from Newbury. There are lots and lots of dangers but I want to throw plenty of mud in later legs so it's Rosallion banker and devil take the hindmost.
A - 10 Rosallion
Leg 2 - Coventry Stakes:
The 123 last year were 80/1, 40/1, 50/1 so I'm putting a cast of thousands on a dreamy C ticket. I'll need A horses to place in the all other five legs for this to fly and, in truth, it's probably not too smart. I'm also loading up on A's. If we survive leg 2, it will be interesting.
A - 1 American Gulf, 9 Gstaad, 12 Postmodern, 13 Power Blue, 20 Underwriter
C - 4 Bone Marra, 5 Bourbon Blues, 6 Coppull, 8 Gavoo, 10 Kolkata Knight, 16 Shaatir, 17 Super Soldier, 19 Tricky Tel
Leg 3 - King Charles III Stakes:
23 runners, only three places up for grabs. Sheesh. Regional is fast, so too Asfoora who sees out a stiff five well as she did when winning this last year. Believing is a third very obvious dart. Hard to see all three missing the podium. Ed Walker has improved Mgheera since she arrived from France and she may not be finished yet.
A - 7 Regional, 12 Asfoora, 14 Believing, 16 Mgheera
Leg 4 - St James's Palace Stakes:
I really want to bank on Henri Matisse but I'm not brave enough. You might be!
A - 1 Field Of Gold, 3 Henri Matisse
Leg 5 - Ascot Stakes:
Willie has a good grip on the market here, and he's bagged Buick and Moore to ride Poniros and Reaching High respectively. That pair will take out chunks of the pool between them so we need to find something that might knock them off the tickets. Poniros is drawn higher than ideal. East India Dock's jump mark of 145+ implies he has a bit more to give on the level though he's been in a lot of scraps without a break. 18 is a bad draw, too. Manxman is progressive, handles big fields, is tactically versatile and has a great post. Mr Hampstead has snuck in at the bottom of the weights and is also well drawn and progressive.
Woot City is well related, well drawn and a massive price. C. Divine Comedy placed last year and the trainer has a fantastic Ascot record. Also C, along with the well drawn guesses Ascending and Saturn.
C - 3 Divine Comedy, 9 Ascending, 12 Saturn, 18 Woot City
Leg 6 - Wolferton Stakes:
Only once since this race became a non-handicap in 2018 has the unnamed favourite missed the frame - and that was in the inaugural non-handicap renewal. It's likely to be Enfjaar but we'll let the market decide. On B, I'll roll with a Wathnan trio in Haunted Dream, Torito and King's Gambit.
A - Unnamed favourite
B - 10 Haunted Dream, 11 King's Gambit, 15 Torito
Full ticket view
For pennies, £24.96 stakes. A single placed entry from A in each leg gives a 4p winning line, but of course it's possible to get more than one in each.
Full disclosure: even if this perm gets 'winning' tickets, there's a chance it pays less than the total stakes. We're really trying to get something interesting to happen at some point in the sequence!
The full A (green) B (yellow) C (tan) view looks like this:
And the breakdown by ticket is like this:
Remember, you need to have a placed selection in each leg on at least one ticket. That means at least four races with A picks placing.
Place your Tix bets here - and you'll be in line for a 5% bonus on winning tickets, and a chance to win £50 daily through Royal Ascot.
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/TixPicks.png320830Matt Bisognohttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngMatt Bisogno2025-06-16 12:01:422025-06-16 17:23:01Royal Ascot Tix Picks, Day 1
Aidan O’Brien’s Illinois and Francis-Henri Graffard’s Candelari have the chance to fill the void left by Kyprios after standing their ground for the Gold Cup at Royal Ascot.
There is a vacancy at the top of the staying tree after the recent retirement of O’Brien’s dual Gold Cup hero, but hopes are high Illinois could prove a ready-made replacement judged on his impressive Ormonde Stakes success at Chester.
O’Brien has also confirmed Coronation Cup hero Jan Brueghel, but Illinois is poised for a mouthwatering showdown with Graffard’s French raider, who announced himself at the top-level with a sublime performance at ParisLongchamp in the Prix Vicomtesse Vigier.
John and Thady Gosden’s Trawlerman and Sweet William have been regular bridesmaids to Kyprios and now have the chance of their moment in the spotlight, with the former winning well in his Sandown reappearance.
Andrew Balding’s Coltrane is another regular in this event, but he will have to reverse Sagaro Stakes form with Michael Bell’s Yashin to make his presence felt, with Bell looking to recreate the Gold Cup exploits of Big Orange from 2017.
Saeed bin Suroor has confirmed Dubai Gold Cup scorer Dubai Future, with James Ferguson’s Wonder Legend given the chance to transfer his smart all-weather form on turf.
The 10-strong list is rounded off by Alan King’s stalwart Trueshan, although the warm weather has the potential to once again scupper any hope of him appearing in this race.
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/280003930-scaled.jpg12802560https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.png2025-06-13 11:42:312025-06-13 17:25:16Illinois and Candelari on course for Gold Cup showdown
Confidence is building that Satono Reve can become the first Japanese-trained winner at Royal Ascot.
The sprinter is in the care of Noriyuki Hori, who is a leading handler in his homeland and will have his first runner at the Royal meeting when his six-year-old lines up in the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes in the hands of top international jockey Joao Moreira.
Satono Reve had the assistance of Ryan Moore as he underwent his final preparations for his Ascot assignment on Newmarket’s July course on Wednesday morning, with Hori happy with how his contender has settled into his temporary surroundings in British racing’s heartland.
Ryan Moore rode Satono Reve at Newmarket (Adam Morgan/PA)
“After arriving from Hong Kong, Satono Reve had some time to recover before steadily building up his training,” said Hori.
“We completed his final gallop before the race – a five-furlong piece on the July course at Newmarket, ridden by Ryan Moore.
“Although it’s a different environment from what he’s used to, he’s been coming along well thanks to the warm support of James Horton, his team and everyone involved.”
Ride on-board SATONO REVE as Ryan Moore puts the star Japanese sprinter through his paces at Newmarket ahead of the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at #RoyalAscot next Saturday #サトノレーヴ | #ロイヤルアスコットpic.twitter.com/34I6pPP0A8
There have been 10 previous attempts to find the Royal Ascot scoresheet by Japanese challengers, but Satono Reve brings top-class form to the table having enjoyed Grade One success at home and also twice chasing home Hong Kong sprint sensation Ka Ying Rising.
His odds for the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes have tumbled in recent days, as the case for his challenge has become more evident, with Paddy Power making him a 6-1 chance for the final Group One of the meeting on Saturday week.
Paddy Power spokesman Paul Binfield said: “There’s been a bit of interest for the Japanese raider and while it’s hard to equate winning a Grade One at Chukyo with the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes, the volume we’ve seen has forced us into evasive action and the Hori-trained runner is into 6-1.”
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/77dcc266-0e10-48f5-b59c-6298576d745d.jpg8861772https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.png2025-06-12 10:32:472025-06-12 13:00:18Satono Reve settling in well as Royal Ascot support continues
There are three festivals a year I get really excited about, writes Dave Renham. The Cheltenham Festival and Glorious Goodwood are two; and the third, which is soon to be upon us, is of course Royal Ascot. Around this time last year I looked in detail at the big 1-mile handicaps at the meeting - you can catch up with that piece here. This year I am concentrating on the Group 1 races.
Introduction
There are eight Group 1s run at the Royal meeting and they are as follows:
As would be expected, there is a good mix of different race distances and conditions although there is only one Group 1 race at a distance beyond 1m 2f, the Gold Cup.
In this article I am looking back on the last ten years of these Group 1 contests, trying to find any snippets that may help us when tackling the races this year. Profit and losses have been calculated to Betfair Starting Price (BSP) less 2% commission.
Royal Ascot Group 1s by Market Rank
Let me start by examining the market. I have ranked the runners based on BSP, which is the most accurate way of doing it. Further, it eliminates almost all of the ‘joint’ market positions.
These races have definitely been market-friendly with the top three betting positions each producing a blind profit. Those fourth in the Betfair betting lists have performed poorly but due to the modest sample we can perhaps assume this is an anomaly. Regardless, it seems that the top three in the betting are the ones to concentrate on.
Group 1 Favourites at Royal Ascot
Narrowing in on favourites, below are the Percentage of Rivals Beaten (PRB) figures for each individual race to help give a better overview of favourite performance in specific races. For the record the average PRB figures for favourites across the eight races combined stands at 0.76.
There has been quite a variance with Gold Cup favourites performing best, and by some margin. Their actual performance in the Gold Cup has been as follows:
During the ten year study period the Gold Cup favourite secured five wins, two seconds, a third and two fourths, so no BSP jolly has completely bombed out.
Royal Ascot Group 1s: Top 3 Market Ranks
If we undertake the same type of PRB analysis across the top three in the betting, the graph generally becomes more even:
The St James’s Palace has the highest figure now with the Gold Cup a close second. Nine of the ten winners of the St James’s Palace came from the top three in the betting (four favourites, three second favs, two third favs).
Conversely, of all the races the Commonwealth Cup has seen fancied runners struggle the most. Favourites have won three of the last ten Commonwealth Cup renewals, but there were no wins for second favourites (two wins for third favs). Quite a few horses that were in the top three of the betting have bombed out with 10 of the 30 failing to finish in the top ten, three of them being favourites.
It should be noted that the four winning Commonwealth Cup favourites in the past decade more than paid for the other six losing jollies, returning a profit of 2.55 units at BSP.
Royal Ascot Group 1s by Last Time Out (LTO) Position
The second area I want to look at is recent performance and specifically LTO finishing position. Here is a breakdown of performance by last day finishing position (I have grouped all horses together that finished fifth or worse LTO):
The BSP profit for those that finished third LTO has been totalled skewed by the 140.0 BSP winner Khaadem. LTO winners do look the group to concentrate on with over half of the 80 winners having also won on their most recent start. If we combine LTO winners with a position in the top three in the betting, then we see some excellent results: 36 winners from 115 runners (SR 31.13%) for a profit of £30.50 (ROI +26.5%); A/E 1.14.
It is also worth keeping an eye out for LTO winners that won by at least a length in the race prior to Ascot. These runners have scored 18.9% of the time (30 wins from 159) for a profit of £29.13 (ROI +18.3%).
Royal Ascot Group 1s by Last Time Out (LTO) Race Class
Onto looking at the class of race LTO. Here are the splits:
As we would expect horses that ran in Group 1 company last time have won most often. Those that raced in Group 3 or Listed Class LTO have been profitable, but both have been skewed by very big priced winners going in. Still, Royal Ascot is a meeting where horses fairly consistently win at massive odds.
LTO winners that contested a Group 1 race have actually offered poor value despite a strike rate of close to 30%. The 51 qualifiers lost over 28p in the £ if backing them to repeat the Group 1 win at Royal Ascot.
Royal Ascot Group 1s by Days Since Last Run (DSLR)
It is time to see whether the timing of the last run before Royal Ascot makes a difference. It should be noted this data does not include French, American or Australian runners as I do not have facility to check those. However, it still applies to over 90% of Ascot runners. Here are my findings:
As the table shows, I have included 50 to 240 days as a single group simply because there are very few runners within that grouping, and their performance has been poor. I wanted to help highlight the difference between that group and the group absent 241+ days (or eight months-plus).
The biggest cohort had a run between 22 and 35 days prior to Ascot and their results have been positive given the overall context. To give a broader overview let me share the PRB figures for each ‘days off track’ grouping:
These figures correlate with the win strike rates. The figures for 22 to 35 days and 241 days+ are clearly best. Finally in this section, below is the ten-year performance in Royal Ascot Group 1s of horses from the top three in the betting by days since last run:
Again, this points to the same two groups (22 to 35 days; 241+ days) as the areas in which to focus from a positive perspective. They would have offered punters very good value over the past ten years.
Royal Ascot Group 1 Trainers
The final area I will consider is that of trainers although it should be noted that data is limited. There are a handful of trainers who have saddled at least 20 runners in Royal Ascot Group 1s in the last ten years, and they are shown in the following table:
It is important not to take these figures (especially big profit lines) too literally due to the sample sizes. It is probably more prudent to look at the PRB values to give a better general indication of how each trainer's horses have run:
William Haggas, despite having just one winner from 24, has an excellent PRB figure so it looks like he has been somewhat unlucky in recent years. He has endured five second places, as well as four thirds and five fourths. Haggas looks a trainer that may offer some placepot/ each way value at the very least next week.
By contrast, Roger Varian’s runners have really struggled although a good proportion of his charges have been bigger prices. Indeed, Charyn, in last year's Queen Anne Stakes is Varian's sole Royal Ascot G1 winner to date. There are sure to be more in future but his seem a little over-bet.
Other trainer titbits to share include the fact that Aidan O’Brien's 13 Group 1 winners in the past decade have all been ridden by Ryan Moore (from 61 rides). All other jockeys riding for O'Brien are a combined 0 from 43 since 2015, although again most of these runners were outsiders. Sticking with O’Brien it seems best to concentrate on those starting favourite or second favourite. They have combined to produce 12 of his 13 winners (from 34 qualifiers) returning a small 2p in the £. Finally, albeit from a very small sample, the Gosden stable has had four winners and four placed runners from just 13 runners aged four.
Summary
The Group 1 races at Royal Ascot are the races that owners, trainers and jockeys covet the most, although any win at the Royal meeting is huge.
In terms of the Group 1s, the most fancied runners - those in the top three in the betting - have fared much the best. Don’t be put off by horses having their first run in more than eight months (241+ days) and we might also consider a break of 22 to 35 days (three to five weeks) as more of a positive than a negative.
A last day win is preferable to other finishing positions and a last time out win coupled with a top three position in the betting market has been a very strong positive. From the training ranks, William Haggas appears to have been quite unlucky in the past decade and certainly I’ll be popping a few of his runners in my placepots at the very least. Aidan O’ Brien runners are worth noting if starting in the top two of the betting and particularly when ridden by Ryan Moore.
Wishing you the best of luck with your Royal Ascot Group 1 wagers.
- DR
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Kyprios_MojoStar_Stradivarius_GoldCup_Ascot2022.jpg319830Dave Renhamhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngDave Renham2025-06-09 12:35:212025-06-09 12:35:21Royal Ascot 2025: Analysing The Group 1 Races
It’s so difficult if you aren’t sure where to look, writes Tony Stafford. I’ve got a 2002 Directory Of the Turf and a few Horses In Training to help me and also the BHA web pages, but can I find a copy of the latest Weight For Age scale? No, I can’t. At which point, dozens of people – if that many read this, of course - will be jumping up and down and saying, here it is you idiot. [Here it is, you absolute gent - Ed.]
The nearest I got was to project forward two months to a race I know allows two-year-olds to compete with their elders. Of course, it’s the Coolmore Wootton Bassett Nunthorpe Stakes over five furlongs at York’s Ebor meeting.
Two-year-olds carry 8st 3lb and three-year-old have 9st 11lb. You’d think that would be more than enough for a juvenile to take advantage and beat his/her elders. The last two to do so were Lyric Fantasy (7st 8lb for Michael Roberts) in 1992 for the Richard Hannon senior stable, Lord Carnarvon’s filly beating stable-companion Mr Brooks and Lester Piggott by half a length.
The last male winner of the race was the John Best-trained and John Mayne-owned Kingsgate Native 19 years ago and I remember thinking him a good thing. He and Jimmy Quinn did the business that day and these are the only two since Ennis in 1956!
The WFA allusion is significant. If the scale requires a concession of 22lb by older horses to their juniors over five furlongs in August, then extending that to seven furlongs and going back even earlier into the season, to mid-June, surely must take the number past 30lb [it's 38lb from the start of July - Ed.].
On Saturday at Royal Ascot, the very high-class Haatem was shrewdly directed from the Group 1 company he had been keeping down to Group 3 for the Jersey Stakes for three-year-olds. The 2000 Guineas third, behind Notable Speech and Rosallion, his stable-mate and the only horse to beat him in the Irish 2000, left the St James’s Palace to that horse and dropped back a furlong.
He won, but was all out in a race where there were three in a line as they passed the post and the first ten were all at it hammer and tongs in the last 100 yards. Haatem recorded a time of 1 minute 26.85 seconds.
Two hours earlier, the opening race on day five, the Chesham Stakes, a seven-furlong Listed race for juveniles, threw up the most spectacular performance of the week. Here, Bedtime Story, a daughter of Frankel out of dual Nunthorpe winner (at age four and five) Mecca’s Angel, making her second start, was simply sensational.
Ryan Moore waited until just before the two-furlong pole before sending her into the lead and she sauntered further and further clear right to the line. The winning margin was nine and a half lengths, despite Ryan’s having no need to do more than keep time with her action.
Neither did he bother to correct the slight coming off a straight line in the last furlong, moving maybe three or four horse widths to the left. Her winning time? 1 minute 27.01 seconds, just one-sixth of a second slower than Haatem, carrying 6lb less. The fillies in the Jersey Stakes carried 5lb less than Haatem.
In form terms, Bedtime Story’s run was far in excess of Haatem’s once the scale is considered and was a reminder of the day last summer when the same Hannon horse saw the backside of City Of Troy in the Superlative Stakes.
He did get his revenge at Newmarket on City Of Troy’s baffling - even to Aidan O’Brien and Ryan Moore - run in the 2000 Guineas but it was back to normal as City Of Troy romped home in the Derby and also for much of last week for the Ballydoyle team.
Before the week started, Ryan had confided to a friend that Auguste Rodin, Opera Singer and Kyprios were his top three. Opera Singer hardly let the side down with second place in the Ribblesdale, but Auguste Rodin and Kyprios were both right back at their best. Judging how the former’s stylish success was celebrated by some of the visiting Australian contingent, his future, either on the track or in the breeding shed, might well be interesting.
My meeting began with one of those omissions that could easily have spoilt the whole five days. I stood in the paddock chatting to Sam Sangster and Brian Meehan as the juveniles for race two, the Coventry Stakes, waited to go into the stalls.
Brian had told me in the morning how he expected a big run from Rashabar, who was drawn on the far side, running in Sam’s Manton Thoroughbreds colours. Before the race it would have been guesswork as to which side would be favoured. As Rashabar detached himself from his group coming to the last furlong, you could see there were challengers aplenty on the near side.
They flashed over the line together but wide apart and it was by a nose that Rashabar prevailed with the next nine home all on the other flank. Eleventh home but second on his side was the Coolmore favourite Camille Pissarro, four lengths behind.
Brian Meehan has begun to specialise in 80/1 winners; he also had one, Monkey Island, at Newbury during York’s Dante meeting. The 80/1 here stretched to 129/1 on the Tote, of which I foolishly forgot to accommodate myself on the way down from the stands. Billy Loughnane, only 18, deserved all his glowing comments for an excellent ride.
Meehan also was successful later in the meeting in a Group 3 with the lightly-raced three-year-old Jayarebe, owned by Iraj Parvizi, back with the trainer after a longish gap. Brian won the Breeders’ Cup Turf for the owner with Dangerous Midge in 2010 at Churchill Downs.
It’s always nice to record successes by friends, but in the case of Wilf Storey it’s almost becoming an embarrassment. Probably last week or maybe the one before, I recounted the tale of Edgewater Drive and his win at Carlisle.
Last Monday, now faced by older horses and from a 7lb higher mark, the Dandy Man three-year-old gelding bolted up again under the much-underrated Paula Muir. I had mentioned the absurd disqualification of a recent winner of Paula’s at Wolverhampton, one which carried the added injustice of a two-day ban.
Paula learnt before Edgewater Drive’s race that the Wolverhampton disqualification had been overturned as had her ban. A double bubble for her.
On Saturday evening at Ayr, nicely sandwiching the entire Royal meeting, she and Wilf Storey were reunited with the seven-year-old Going Underground. Winner of just one of his 32 previous races and off through injury for a year until a recent comeback run, he came from miles back to win on the line. You rarely see that type of finishing speed in 0-50 Classifieds. If his old wheels can handle it – Going Underground not Wilf - he should win again.
Earlier this year, Paula was considering giving up and had been training for a future career as a dog groomer, but five wins in short time for Storey have no doubt helped change her mind. Much of the credit for the team withstanding owners wishing to replace her at several stages in the past have been met firmly by Wilf and granddaughter Siobhan Doolan, the assistant trainer.
As to the Storey story. My friend of almost exactly 40 years has run four individual horses on the flat this year – all picked up for a total of less than 20k at various Newmarket sales. Between them they have had ten runs in 2024 and won five of them. There can’t be many trainers, let alone this veteran, well into his 80’s, with a 50% strike-rate!
- TS
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/BedtimeStory_Chesham2024.jpg319830Tony Staffordhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngTony Stafford2024-06-24 07:31:212024-06-24 07:31:21Moday Musings: For Age
And so to the fourth and final quarter of the geegeez.co.uk daily race previews, Friday, Day 4. Two Group 1's, led out by the relatively new Commonwealth Cup and followed up with a cracking Coronation Stakes, are the features but there's plenty to go at from start to end, beginning with the...
2.30 Albany Stakes (6f, Group 3, 2yo fillies)
Presented by John Burke's "Victor Value" service
It's hard to believe we've already reached the fourth day of Royal Ascot — time certainly flies when you're having fun. This is my final day of previewing a daily race for Geegeez, and I've genuinely enjoyed it. I hope you've found my musings on the various contests both insightful and enjoyable.
On Wednesday, I tipped a 20/1 winner for Victor Value subscribers. Interestingly, if I hadn’t been previewing the juvenile races for this site, I probably wouldn’t have even looked at that race. So I owe a big thanks to Matt Bisogno for pushing me in the two-year-old direction. [You're welcome, John - just wish I'd given you the Windsor Castle for Wednesday! - Ed.]
Today, let's talk about the Albany Stakes, a prestigious Group 3. Here are some key details about the race: Run over six furlongs the Albany Stakes was inaugurated in 2002, making it one of the newer races at the Royal Ascot meeting. Initially classified at Listed level, it was promoted to Group 3 status in 2005, reflecting its growing importance and quality of participants.
Over the years, several winners of the Albany Stakes have gone on to achieve greater success in their racing careers, enhancing the race's reputation as a launchpad for future champions. For instance, the last two winners, Porta Fortuna (2023) and Meditate (2022), both went on to achieve Group 1 success. Winning or performing well in the Albany Stakes can significantly enhance the reputation and value of a filly, both in terms of racing and breeding potential.
The Albany Stakes continues to maintain its status as a key early-season race for two-year-old fillies.
Key Trends (Last 5 Years):
Last Time Out Track: Naas – 2 winners from 5 runners +40, 3 places
Last Time Out Placing: 1st - 5 winners from 86 runners, 15 places (non-winners last time are 0 from 33 runners, 4 places)
Key Contenders:
Fairy Godmother
Trainer: Aidan O’Brien. Fairy Godmother built on her debut promise by defeating five rivals in the Group 3 Fillies' Sprint Stakes at Naas last time. The daughter of Night Of Thunder is bred to be speedy and sets a high standard.
Heavens Gate
Trainer: Aidan O’Brien. Heavens Gate won a Curragh maiden over the distance 26 days ago. Like Fairy Godmother, she is open to further improvement. She has the rail draw in stall 17.
Mountain Breeze
Trainer: Charlie Appleby. Mountain Breeze looked impressive when winning at Newmarket last month. The daughter of Lope De Vega is now two from two and is poised for a big run, posing the main threat to the favourite in my view.
California Dreamer
Trainer: Adrian Murray. California Dreamer finished a length third to Fairy Godmother at Naas. This was a significant improvement from her Dundalk debut, indicating she has more to offer, although beating Fairy Godmother will be tough.
Twafeeg
Trainer: Archie Watson. Twafeeg showcased her speed by winning on debut at Doncaster 20 days ago. There is more to come from her, and an Archie Watson juvenile should never be underestimated at Royal Ascot.
Simmering
Trainer: Ollie Sangster. Simmering showed plenty of promise on her debut at York, finishing third behind Arabie, who has since won a Group 3 at Chantilly. Sent off the 3/1 favourite at York she must have been showing plenty at home. While beating top contenders like Fairy Godmother and Mountain Breeze will be tough, Simmering has room for plenty of improvement. With Jamie Spencer on board, she could get into the places.
Albany Stakes Verdict:
Fairy Godmother sets a high bar and will be tough to beat, but Mountain Breeze is also a strong contender and should provide a stern challenge. Twafeeg, coming off a recent win at Doncaster, has solid each-way claims. The most intriguing runner in the line-up is Simmering, who arguably has the most potential for improvement among the 17 fillies.
Betting Advice:
My idea of the winner is Fairy Godmother and 13/8 looks a fair price about her chance but if you’re looking for an each-way play at big odds I would consider Simmering if you can get 25/1 and four places.
Simmering: £2 each way – 25/1 @ bet365 (paying four places)
3.05 Commonwealth Cup (6f, Group 1, 3yo)
Preview by Matt Bisogno
Introduced in 2015, this six furlong Group 1 for three-year-olds only is a terrific addition to the Royal Ascot menu. It's been a slot where failed Classic aspirants have rediscovered their top class mojo over a more suitable trip; and where genuinely fast horses can show their (go faster) stripes. In its nine years to date, no trainer has taken the prize more than once, and no horse has returned greater than 12/1 in spite of big fields being commonplace.
Sheikh Obaid has a strong hand with, at time of writing, the first two in the betting. Inisherin was supplemented at some expense, even by a Sheikh's standard, after an easy score in the Group 2 Sandy Lane Stakes at Haydock. He'd previously led the 2000 Guineas field to the quarter pole before the lactic acid kicked in and he checked out. Remarkably, and atypically, he'd never run shorter than a mile prior to the Haydock race. That's a bit of a question mark given it was soft ground there, and so more of an emphasis on stamina, whereas it will be fast turf here. Moreover, leading against milers who are saving something for the final two furlongs is different from trying to best the fastest and classiest speedsters of his generation. He has an obvious chance to win but looks opposable at the prices.
Arrow number two in Sheikh Obaid's quiver is Elite Status, who lived up to his name when hacking up in a Listed race over this trip at Newbury last time. Trained by Karl Burke, who has trained a Commonwealth Cup winner, he's had plenty of experience, with four wins from seven starts thus far. They include a second Listed score as well as a Group 3 but he was thumped in both the Prix Morny and Middle Park (both G1) at the end of last season. You could argue that he was over the top for them, but it is also not unreasonable to take a less charitable view of those no shows. Perhaps he's not quite at this level.
Jasour was beaten in that same brace of top level two-year-old sprints, and also bookended those heavy defeats with Pattern class wins: in his case he preceded them with a G2 victory and debuted this campaign with a G3, over course and distance in the trial race to boot. That was a notable career best and it's perfectly plausible that he's improved plenty from two to three. This, of course, will be the acid test. His trainer, Clive Cox, has, like Burke, won this race before so knows the formula.
Third to Big Evs and Valiant Force, both 2023 Royal Ascot winners, in the G1 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint, Starlust showed there that he could handle very fast ground. He was staying on over that turning five furlongs but has beaten plenty of times (eight, to be exact, from a dozen starts). Moreover, his best form is mostly at the minimum and he looks exposed in comparison with some of his rivals. That said, he does bring the highest official rating into the race, his 114 being earned with a nine pounds hike for an easy handicap verdict last time.
Givemethebeatboys was due to run in that Breeders' Cup race but was scratched by the Santa Anita vets the day before the race, a deeply frustrating experience for all involved, no doubt. Before then, he'd run creditably in the Phoenix and Middle Park Stakes, and holds Elite Status and Jasour on literal analyses of that form. He began 2024 with a Listed win at Navan before just failing to pass the intended but now absent Bucanero Fuerte in a Naas Group 3 last time. This stiff six looks ideal though he'll need to improve a good bit.
Archie Watson has an excellent record at Royal Ascot - three wins last year, just failed in the Coventry over course and distance on Tuesday - and saddles Evade, winner of the 7f Surrey Stakes last time. Trained prior to that Epsom race by Andre Fabre, he'd finished 2023 with a distant view of Rosallion's rump in the Group 1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere. But it was a big step forward on Oaks day, where he was tardy from the gate but showed plenty of speed to move to the front of the field; he then battled gamely while seeming unbalanced on the camber and can arguably be marked up a touch.
Classic Flower runs for Patrice Cottier, who saddled Horizon Dore to run third in the Group 1 Prince Of Wales's Stakes on Wednesday. In the same ownership, this daughter of Calyx has been second on all three starts in '24, all on very wet turf. Her trainer must fancy her to show more on terra firmer, and she did win a Group 2 on good to soft last October. Her form is hard to peg - likely a beat below the pick of her rivals - but she is consistent, could conceivably step forward for fast turf, and her trainer is respected.
The rest of them probably have too much to find but I want to mention two highly progressive runners who wouldn't be total shock winners. Firstly, Stuart Williams trains Pandora's Gift, a filly that has raced exclusively on all-weather surfaces heretofore. Second on her debut as a 20/1 shot, she's won her other four starts, most recently when waltzing away with a Listed prize at Chelmsford. Prior to that she won in a manner rarely seen in a valuable all-weather handicap. She went up 12lb for that win and another 11lb for her Listed victory. If she can translate that level to turf, a further similar bound forward would put her bang there. If.
The twice-raced Kind Of Blue is the other worth noting. James Fanshawe has had some very good sprinters - remember The Tin Man? - and while it's very early to include this colt's name in the same sentence, he looked very good in the second of two novice stakes wins last time. That was good to firm ground on Doncaster's straight track, so no conditions fears, but this is a chasmic class rise. One to keep on side going forwards and it will be interesting, though not wager worthy, to see how he goes in this G1.
This is quite difficult. I want to be against Inisherin, whose ability to lead may be compromised against genuine top class sprinters. Obviously, I expect him to win now. Elite Status made a big jump on figures on his sole three-year-old start and may have matured into a far better model, with similar comments applying to the slightly more lightly-raced Jasour; the latter is a bigger price and appeals as a bit of value at around 6/1. And at Hail Mary prices, I want to take penny flyers on the two fillies, Classic Flower and Pandora's Gift. There are reasons to believe both could step forward a chunk on what they've achieved under these markedly different conditions and, while they might fail badly, the price justifies small interest. Two fillies have won this in its short history so there are no reservations on that score: it's 'simply' whether they'll be remotely good enough!
If I'm wrong about the Sheikh Obaid pair, so be it, but it looks a more open contest than the top two to me...
Suggestion: 80% of a unit win Jasour at 6/1, 5% e/w Classic Flower 33/1 and 5% e/w 25/1 Pandora's Gift
3.45 Coronation Stakes (1m, Group 1, 3yo fillies)
Preview by Rory Delargy
Donnacha O’Brien’s Porta Fortuna is arguably more exposed than a few around her in the market for the Coronation Stakes, but she is proven at the highest level and her form stacks up well given she has previous at the track and the likely fast ground suits her ideally.
Porta Fortuna was a decisive winner of the Albany Stakes here twelve months ago, where she impressed with the way she moved through the race before taking it up at the furlong pole and repelling the challenge of Matrika. She was below form on softer ground in both the Phoenix Stakes and the Moyglare Stud Stakes (5¾ lengths joint-third to subsequent Irish 1000 Guineas winner Fallen Angel) but belatedly built on her Royal Ascot win when clocking a smart time in the Cheveley Park Stakes at Newmarket at the end of September, beating Rubies And Pearls by a length and a half on ground Timeform called good to firm.
She then ran a screamer in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies’ Turf on her first try at a mile, and again shaped really well after an absence when second in the 1000 Guineas on good ground. She was forced to go earlier than ideal there in pursuit of Ramatuelle, and that pair gave Guineas winner Elmalka a target to aim at, with the margin between the trio at the line very small. The closing sectional suggesting that the winner was favoured by making her move latest of all.
The pair she split are both respected but I’m more than happy to continue to support Porta Fortuna, who has more than once shown herself to be very game under pressure. The fact that she is proven on track and ground is a big positive and the turning mile should suit better than the straight one at Newmarket given her tactical speed.
Ramatuelle could be considered an unlucky loser at Newmarket with plenty blaming Aurelien Lemaitre for kicking too soon but, while Lemaitre has made a couple of high-profile errors, I thought he gave the Justify filly an excellent ride, maximising her superior speed at a crucial part of the race and almost stealing it as a result. My view is that she barely stays 7f and that she will be vulnerable here where she has a draw in stall one which means she must either be ridden aggressively to get track position, or hope that others give her room which is far from certain.
Elmalka is unexposed and will be fancied by many to progress again, but we saw Notable Speech fail to match his 2000 Guineas effort in the St James’s Palace earlier in the week, and Ascot does present challenges of its own. As mentioned, I thought that while the ground she made up late looked remarkable she happened to be in the right part of the track the way that race unfolded, and I’m not sold on her superiority on the day.
Recommended: 1pt e/w Porta Fortuna @ 7/1 (general)
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4.25 Duke Of Edinburgh Stakes (1m4f, Class 2 handicap, 3yo+)
Presented by Sam Darby's "Winning Post Profits" service
This is probably my favourite race of the week and one of the best course and distances to have a bet on in big fields. That’s because there is a strong draw bias that is largely overlooked in the betting.
The line graph above shows the PRB3 performance by draw. It’s quite clear that the bottom eight or so stalls perform far worse than any higher stall and this trend is repeated with the win and place data too. The lowest seven stalls have won four handicaps on good or better ground whilst the next eleven stalls have won twenty times in the same time period.
The heat map shows draw and pace in combination and this is even more enlightening. There seems to be a fairly significant advantage in racing prominently or in mid-division from middle to high draws. Those run styles/draw combinations have accounted for 14 of the last 20 handicap winners in these conditions.
The only other ‘positive’ draw and run style combination is leaders from middle draws. The worst performing combinations are high drawn front runners and low drawn hold up performers.
It’s relatively easy to explain this draw bias. Big field mile and a half handicaps here can be really rough races where those on the rail often don’t get anything resembling a clear run. They don’t get long to sort themselves out in the straight so the horses that are a bit handier, and on the outside, are well positioned in relation to the lead and are pretty much guaranteed a clear run.
Fortunately, the one I’ve liked for this since the declarations first came out is a prominent racer and drawn high, which should see him to maximum effect. For quick reference, you can use the Geegeez Gold pace map below to see which horses fall into the likely advantaged category here.
On Tuesday I was strongly against Belloccio in the Copper Horse Stakes because Willie Mullins needed to suddenly improve the horse by 10lbs+ on turf for him to figure. Mullins worked his magic and the horse won well. My gripe with the Mullins horses is we know from previous experience that they are very likely to win or run well. At the same time, they often come here unproven over the trips at which they are running, unproven on the ground and their handicap marks are usually complete guesswork. That’s not the case with Ethical Diamond who ticks all those boxes and also even boasts some of my beloved ‘hot form’.
As a 3yo, before moving to Mullins’ yard he improved for the step up in trip from 10f to 12f, when beating a subsequently 94-rated runner up by 2 lengths giving her 5lbs. That run alone makes him look well treated as he is also rated 94 now himself.
He didn’t really fire over hurdles for Mullins but the ground was testing on all three occasions and he was very highly tried. The return to the flat in May did the trick, though, as he was beaten just a short head over 10f at Leopardstown. The winner has since won a handicap off an 8lb higher mark (admittedly over further) whilst the 3rd has since won a 19-runner handicap (admittedly over shorter).
Ethical Diamond has unfortunately gone up 5lbs for that effort but the form looks strong and he’s almost certain to improve for the step back up to 12f here. He likes to race prominently and is drawn in stall 18 (will probably be 16 by the time the reserves come out) so the only thing not to get excited about is the price. He’s around 5/2 at the time of writing and although that might seem short in a big field handicap, it looks pretty fair given how lightly raced he is and the scope there is for more to come stepping back up in trip.
If the race doesn’t go to Willie Mullins, it still looks more than likely it will go back to Ireland as they have a strong grip on this. Crystal Black is a very progressive rival, winning four of his last five starts. He’s been winning over a mile and also 10f and having that mile pace suggests he might not see out this trip. He’s also drawn in stall 4 which is another reason I'm happy to take him on.
Deakin represents last year’s winning trainer, Joseph O'Brien, and he was a neck behind Crystal Black over 10f last time out. Unlike Crystal Black, he’s very much proven over this trip and should have a good chance of reversing that form here considering the extra trip and also the fact he’s drawn in stall 21 (will be 18 after the reserves come out). He’s unproven on fast ground but has coped fine with good and looks a likely player.
Behind Crystal Black and Deakin last time out was Safecracker and he looks overpriced at 16/1 or so. He’s proven over this longer trip and, crucially, is also proven on fast ground. His run style isn’t ideal for the round course but I wouldn’t be surprised if he too reverses form with Crystal Black.
The home challenge is headed by Shadow Dance, a Roger Varian-trained 4yo who hasn’t run since finishing runner up in the Old Rowley Cup in October, traditionally one of the stronger 3yo races of the season (last year’s renewal has produced future winners yet again). Varian’s horses have generally been running to form first time out this season and Perotto had the same prep before finishing 3rd in Wednesday’s Royal Hunt Cup. He’s likely to be seen to best effect over further in future and I think he might end up poorly positioned so I’d be slightly again him here, but I fancy his chances of winning a decent 14f handicap before long.
La Yakel also reappears here after a break and, given he’s generally looked better over shorter and on softer turf, he is opposable from stall 1. Fairbanks and Sea King are both progressive and in form but stalls 2 and 6 could be a disadvantage for that pair. In any case, Fairbanks probably showed the handicapper too much when winning comfortably on his penultimate start, and Sea King might be better in smaller fields and when fresh.
Bague D’Or was one I liked for the Copper Horse earlier in the week but the main angle with him is his record over 14f on fast ground. Back in trip, I’m far less keen on him.
In summary, I think there is a good chance we see an Irish one-two in this year's Duke Of Edinburgh Stakes. I’m pretty keen on Ethical Diamond and I’m not put off by his price. Deakinis my clear next best and I might even have a little go on the forecast/exacta. I can see Shadow Dance and Safecracker finishing well from off the pace but they might be at a tactical disadvantage.
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5.05 Sandringham Stakes (1m, Class 2 handicap, 3yo fillies)
Presented by Josh Wright from "Racing To Profit"
These Royal Ascot handicaps do not get any easier and unfortunately for me it is not the strongest of trends races, not against the sort of pointers I use anyway.
However, it should be noted that the market has been some sort of guide with 13 of the 16 winners sent off 11/1 or shorter ISP, those sent off bigger, 3/251, 25p. Having said that, between 2017-2020, three of the four races were won by 20/1+ shots, two trained by Charlie Fellowes, who isn’t represented this year. Over the last three renewals, those sent off 12/1+ are now 0/65, 6p. It would make all our jobs a little easier if the market continued to be some sort of guide, even though I do like the odd big priced-poke in such races.
Ignoring the market for the moment, there are a couple of pointers which can help. Horses that had two or three runs in the previous 90 days, who’d won or placed at least once on their last two starts and who’d run at Class 3+ at least once in their career, would have found 13/15 of the UK/Irish trained winners (Wesley Ward winning this in 2017, not included in these stats).
If that profile was to hold we'd be left with a long list of 12, but without any pointers to narrow it further other than hoping the market is once again a guide. Those twelve are:
Everlasting, Zaynab, Flight of Fancy, Fair Angellica, Battle Queen, Cat Ninja, Asian Daze, Arisaig, Soprano, Marcella, My Margie, Raknah
Looking at horses representing trainers who have won this race previously can also be useful.
- John & Thady Gosden: Cat Ninja, Mrs Morrell, D Fawless, Strutting
- Charlie (and Mark) Johnston: Arisaig
- Johnny Murtagh: Asian Daze
Cat Ninja, Asian Daze, and Arisaig are the three horses to hit my trends profile and which represent yards who know how to win this race.
I'm going for two each-way bets from the trends list, with as many places as you can find, and hope that once again it's the turn of an outsider to take this race.
Arisaig - 25/1 - EW - Charlie Johnston's filly has been in decent form, and his dad knew what was required to win the Sandringham so hopefully that's rubbed off. Arisaig appeared to appreciate more patient tactics when last seen, having been ridden very aggressively at Newmarket the time before, but still running with credit. She showed an impressive change of gear at Lingfield and won like a horse on the upgrade. It was a performance to think that a fast run mile on this straight course with plenty of cover up the middle could be just what she wants. I always like the booking of Jamie Spencer on this track, where you can almost back him blind each way at the Royal Meeting for interest stakes; and he got the job done again yesterday with a 16/1 > 5/1 SP winner. He booted home 90/1 and 140/1 BFSP winners last year. Spencer will switch Arisaig off, get her in a rhythm and allow her to finish her race - I'd like to think that may be good enough to run into the places here, and who knows after that? Evidently she needs to step up again, but she's going the right way and her relative experience could be worth plenty here.
Soprano- 25/1 - EW - George Boughey's filly has been highly tried in her career to date - straight into Group 3s and Listed contests after her Newmarket maiden win - and this is her handicap debut having finished her juvenile season 'winning' her side in the Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes. She's been running with credit, but often running on in small fields with the leaders having set sail for home. It's her first attempt at a mile, and trying such a trip here is never ideal, but that's built into the price and is arguably a reason for a jolt of improvement. Like Arisaig, she may relish this strong pace, being covered up and running through tiring horses. She's related to a few milers on her dam side, so fingers crossed she appreciates the extra distance. Billy Loughnane was on the scoresheet on Day 1 and I'm hoping he'll be patient and try and thread his way through. The yard is in fine form also. Soprano has a touch of class and if seeing out the trip can hopefully grab a place at worst. As always, if you can grab a place, you can win, so fingers crossed.
Predicting any draw bias on this straight track appears impossible and so far this week it appears to have been riding fairly, more a case of where the sustained pace comes from. These two will have the option of staying up the middle, though Jamie could go low if he wishes and Billy could go high if wanted, so all bases covered there.
It could be the market has this right again, Indelible stepping out of maiden/novice company, but she does look very short to my eyes. Ralph Beckett is 0/10, 0p in the race also, which wouldn't fill me with confidence if wading in, but maybe she's just a cut above these - the market suggests so and given how good Ralph is generally, and especially with fillies, he will surely win this at some point.
I could name ten more horses and get nowhere near the winner, it's that sort of contest! However, Arisaig and Soprano are two lively outsiders who look overpriced to my eyes. Some bookies are paying as far down as eight places, which could help! Good luck with any bets.
'Ever fancied owning a share in a racehorse? Josh now has 11 horses in training and over 170 shareholders.
5.40 King Edward VII Stakes (1m4f, Group 2, 3yo colts & geldings)
Presented by Gavin Priestley's "Festival Trends" service
For the purposes of the trends we'll overlook the result from 2020 because, due to Covid, the Derby was actually run after Royal Ascot that year.
Traditionally sandwiched in the middle of the Epsom and Irish Derby's the 'Ascot Derby' is a pale shadow of either of those Group 1's, and the Epsom winner hasn't shown up here in a very long time although the Derby second did run, and win, last year. In fact, five of the last seven winners had their last start at Epsom where they had finished 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 10th (twice).
This year we have just two Derby runners taking part: Voyage, who was actually first past the post at Epsom but did so without a jockey having stumbled and unseated Pat Dobbs shortly after leaving the starting stalls, and Macduff who was quietly fancied for the race but pulled too hard and never got himself into a challenging position.
So, as is usual for the King Edward VII we have a field made up of a couple of also rans from Epsom, a few that missed it for one reason or another, a number of lesser lights from the O'Brien stable, a couple of winners stepping up from novice company and a few trainers tilting at windmills hoping to pick up some black type and place money. We do also have a couple of French raiders to spice things up this year, however, including the 5th from the Prix du Jockey Club.
The trends say we need a run as a 2yo, 1-3 seasonal runs, 2-7 career starts and the most recent within the last 12-56 days in a class 1-3 race where they finished in the first four (unless it was the Derby). All of the last nine winners were rated 103+ and, interestingly, 13 of the last 17 winners had yet to win a Group race. It also hasn't paid to get too fancy odds wise recently with four of the last five favourites winning and eight of the last nine winners returning 7/1 or shorter.
We can knock a few out on the trends for one reason or another but there are still plenty of the field that seem to tick all the boxes so I'm simply going to go with that recent trend regarding the Epsom runners and side with the horse that was down the field in the Derby.
MACDUFF did well as a 2yo and rounded off his season with a 4th in the Royal Lodge before shaping with promise in the Classic Trial at Sandown on his seasonal debut. He was a staying on second there behind Arabian Crown and, on the back of that run, he was nibbled at ante post at big prices for the Derby and was eventually sent off at 14/1. Taking a keen hold he never really got going and raced in rear throughout to come home a disappointing 13th of the 16 runners. Ralph Beckett now reaches for the first time cheekpieces in the hope they'll help settle him (Macduff not Beckett!) and I'm willing to give him another chance based on his earlier form. He wouldn't be the first horse to fail to handle Epsom before winning here, and he does seem a big price on what he had achieved before Derby day.
SELECTION: MACDUFF 1/2pt EW 25/1
6.15 Palace Of Holyroodhouse Stakes (5f, Class 2 handicap, 3yo)
Preview by David Massey
Pace. It’s important. We’re always told “pace yourself”, whether that’s life in general, or you’re on a three-day bender over a bank holiday weekend. (Please drink responsibly.) Without a certain amount of pace, we’d never get to where we want to go. And if it’s over five furlongs at Royal Ascot, you arguably need a bucketful of it, and that’s what this field has. And in spades, too. Buckets and spades...
Wherever you look here, there’s pace: seven of the nine runners drawn in single figures have led at some point in their last three runs, four from the middle and five from those drawn 20 and above. That’s pretty much half the field that like a view of the front, and unless one of them is an Art Power in disguise - remember him back in 2020, they came here instead of the Commonwealth Cup and he absolutely took them apart with a devastating display of front-running - I cannot help but think this will suit something that can travel in midfield and come through late to win it.
Step forward Blue Storm, who has already taken one big handicap this season after winning the 3yo Dash at Epsom last time out, reversing form with three of those that had finished in front of him at Chester on his seasonal reappearance the time before. He was nicely on top at Epsom late, and this stiffer track should suit even better. A 6lb rise for that is fair, he’s now proven himself in a full field, he’ll travel well in centre pack and has the strength late to play a part. He ticks a lot of boxes for a 14-1 chance, for me, and heads up my list.
Fantasy Master hit the frame in this back in 2021 for Mick Appleby and his Shagraan has a similar sort of profile. You’d be hard pressed to say he was unlucky against Equity Law at Sandown two starts back but I was impressed with the way he travelled there and, once he did find the gaps, he stayed on well for second. I thought at the time this might be the race for him after that effort. He did nothing to dissuade me when third to James’s Delight at Newmarket last time, form that’s already working out, and I think he can reverse placings with second home Two Tribes if given a more patient ride today. Mick seems to have rejuvenated the horse after he left Clive Cox, and I suspect he’s had this race in mind for some time. Stall 19 gives him options, too.
Speaking of Clive Cox, his Symbology is worth a mention at a huge price as well. The negatives aren’t hard to find - she’s not shown much in two starts this year, although in her defence, she’d probably have needed her first start of the year in the Carnarvon Stakes at Newbury after nine months away from the track, and then she got no cover at the weekend when well held in the Scurry Stakes. So, yes, you have to be forgiving, but here’s the figures bit - Clive Cox, when running his handicappers within seven days of their last run, is 9-46, which is pretty good on its own, but even better when the expected winners was just over six.
There’s a lot to take on trust and ideally I’d have preferred another furlong, but at 66-1 we don’t have to pay a lot to find out whether she can bounce back to form on a track for which she’s already shown a liking. (In fact, she’s the only horse in the whole field to have finished in the frame at Ascot previously. Another little plus…)
*
And that, dear reader, is that. 28 races covered by seven writers, six of them guests, across four days; and a great smattering of winners already in their midst. Thank you for making geegeez.co.uk a part of your Royal Ascot 2024 experience and, if you like what we do and are not yet a member of our multi-award winning Gold racecards and form tools service, you can take it for a spin for as little as £1 at this link.
Thanks again, and be lucky.
Matt
p.s. What did you think of the previews this week? Did you enjoy them? And what was your personal highlight of the week so far? Please leave a comment below and let us know
There are plenty of ways to wager the Royal meeting. With bookmakers offering 'happy hour' enhanced odds, significant extended places each way, and a top hat-ful of specials and concessions, shopping around the firms is an obvious place to start. In his excellent Money Without Work series on geegeez, pro player Russ Clarke outlined the maths associated with bookie concessions and this is a must read for anyone even faintly serious about trying to come out in front. The series is here, and of specific relevance are parts 4 and 5; if you've not read those, go ahead and do that now - I'll wait 😉
That, of course, is if you can still get on with the bookies. Restrictions, the bane of millions of regular racing bettors, mean that such offers are a frustrating cocked snook: "I have thee not, and yet I see thee still".
Alternatives to traditional bookmakers
Happily, Royal Ascot is a meeting of global importance which bestows upon it more wagering pounds and dollars - Hong Kong, Australian, United States and other brands - than any other meeting in the British calendar. The eyes and wallets of the world are trained on these five days and that presents rare opportunity. Liquidity in UK racing markets is an ongoing challenge: the sharks have decimated the little fish on betting exchanges, and the dear old nanny goat (tote) continues to suffer from a historic lack of investment and promotion under previous stewardships. But both fight back during Royal Ascot week.
Exchanges
On Betfair, top sporting events bring far greater liquidity: backers and layers alike are prepared to risk more capital when they believe the playing field is even. So the exchanges are unquestionably a value option during a meeting like this, especially for win only players.
Keeping an eye on three price lists at once is not for everyone, but it can be a rewarding practice. In reality, of course, it is unlikely that starting price will be the best of the trio of SP, exchange SP and tote return; so unless you've played early with the Best Odds Guaranteed concession it's going to be a straight shoot out between 'the machine' and the nanny.
Their respective markets will be capitalised differently meaning different horses will be better or worse value in each. Here's why. Betfair, the major exchange player (though certainly not the only one in Royal Ascot week), does not allow the world to bet into a single win pool. So it is that UK and Irish punters will bet into one instance, and some overseas jurisdictions will bet into another: each will return a different SP for the race. Materially, plenty of geographies will be unable to (legally) bet on an exchange at all.
Tote / World Pool
Meanwhile, tote offers us World Pool. In partnership with a majority of the biggest international racing countries, including the aforementioned Hong Kong (whose ball it is that everyone plays with), Australia, US, Japan and on, World Pool means millions of quids and bucks and yens and euros are wagered into a single pot.
What that means is that there are blind spots in the markets. Much of the World Pool liquidity emanates from Hong Kong where, it's fair to say, they like a bet. But, as infrequent players on UK gee-gees, the general level of familiarity is commensurately sketchy. I hark back to some formative Saturday mornings punting Turffontein in South Africa, which typically meant no more form study than establishing which unknown equine Piere 'Striker' Strydom was aboard. He may have been the best rider (and he may not), but who knows what chance he had in any given race? I just didn't know about any of the other blokes (as it would have virtually exclusively been back then).
So it is with overseas punters in World Pool. It's a crying shame that there are relatively few international runners at the meeting this year because, as with Brits backing Brits at the Breeders', parochial punters are of the same stripe the world over. Hong Kong'ers will play HK runners, Aussies will back their Bruces and Sheilas, and our American cousins want to wager Wesley. That's human nature. And it is opportunity knocking.
I've managed to get hold of some great insights on last year's World Pool that reveal some of those trainers and jockeys which are overbet, and those which are underbet. More importantly, the logic around them is bombproof: overseas punters bet who they know. Duh.
So, even without Frankie Dettori or a proper away team in 2024, we still have to play Ryan Moore and William Buick, Neil Callan and Silvestre de Sousa, Hollie Doyle and Tom Marquand, as well as most likely Oisin Murphy, with caution on World Pool. The exchange will be a better option. Why? Ryan and William are the best known Euro jocks (and ride first string for the best known training and ownership firms); Callan and SdS were household names around Sha Tin and the Valley of Happy (at least in punting households) when plying their trade there; and Hollie and Tom have been highly successful in HK and Aus. Oisin has strong connections with Japan.
But, away from the international glare, prospects are rosy. The likes of Hayley Turner, Colin Keane, Billy Lee, Wayne Lordan, Kevin Stott, Kieran Shoemark, Clifford Lee, and Richard Kingscote... and, candidly, most of the very good 'stay at home' domestics... will be underbet on World Pool.
The same is true with trainers. Aidan O'Brien, Charlie Appleby, Dermot Weld, and Andrew Balding are no-no's. Big yesses are Eve Johnson Houghton, Jane Chapple-Hyam, George Boughey, and perhaps more surprisingly, the likes of Sir Michael Stoute, William Haggas and Willie Mullins. Loads of our big guns hiding in plain sight from overseas bettors.
How to play?
The easiest way to play this is to compare prices on horses you fancy (or on horses you don't, actually) between exchange and World Pool, and bet where the offer is healthiest. One of the great things about the World Pool is that it is far less susceptible to late price collapses; you'll still see instances of dividends being lower than the last 'show' before the off but it's rarely the deep frustration it can be in the tote payout queue on a rainy December evening at Southwell. A runner showing 12.0 as they enter the stalls is unlikely to return shorter than 10.5, say. If the last bookie show is 15/2 and the exchange shows 9.6, World Pool is the place to play.
It's not impossible that you could make underround books from this sort of cross-referenced cherry picking; or at least fashion a good edge from hedging the top of the market. If you're that way inclined. Me? I'm not especially that way inclined, but I do like an exotic...
...so what about playing combinations of the fancied horses with lesser known connections in the exacta and trifecta pools? Sure, this is a feast and famine existence, but if you hit one you'll likely be dining very well. And it will foot the bill for a lot of near misses and complete blowouts.
Examples
Win Pools
Let's take a couple of examples from last year, starting with the Queen Anne, arguably a bad example because the winner, 33/1 Triple Time, was not an easy one to find, here in Blighty at least. His Betfair SP was 36.45, about 10% better but pretty unsexy given his 'double carpet' starting price. On the tote, he paid £35.05, also pretty unattractive in terms of uplift against SP. But closer inspection reveals he was ridden by Neil Callan, one of the great 'clock' riders in Britain (and, day to day, just about the single most underrated in my view). Callan's ability was/is not lost on Hong Kong players whose wagering respect for him is greater than ours, a fact reflected in that return.
Compare that with the opening race on the Saturday, the Chesham Stakes, won by Snellen. Ridden by Gary Carroll and trained by Gavin Cromwell, names far from the overseas radar, he returned 12/1 at SP, 13.88 BSP, and £14.30 on World Pool. That was followed by the Jersey Stakes where Aidan O'Brien's second string, Ace Of Kings, ridden by Wayne Lordan, was a 22/1 scorer. He paid 34 on the exchange and £34.70 on World Pool, a 50% bonus against SP.
Exacta / Trifecta
In truth, it will often be the case that the best value close to the off is with the exchange if you're playing in the win markets. But what about the exacta/trifecta options? In these pools, which are not generally available on exchanges but compete directly with bookmaker-derived computer straight forecast (CSF) and tricast offerings, we have the chance to multiply lesser known connections. Again, a couple of examples will help.
In the Copper Horse Stakes, the closing 1m6f handicap on the 2023 Tuesday, Willie Mullins saddled a 1-2 with the even money favourite obliging ahead of his 5/1 stablemate. Even though this pair was ridden by Ryan Moore and Frankie Dettori, essentially the two highest profile jockeys at the meeting, the World Pool exacta paid £15.20 against a miserly CSF of £6.11. That would have been one of the easier 14/1 shots we'll ever have the chance to find.
At the other end of the feasibility spectrum, we had the Norfolk Stakes on Thursday where 150/1 Valiant Force beat 66/1 Malc. What chance in the Norfolk? Norfolk and chance! Anyhoo, someone somewhere copped it (my mate Gavin Priestley who, after flagging 33/1 Bradsell for geegeez readers last year, will be contributing again here for Royal Ascot, also put up Valiant Force on his trends service!), and the CSF paid £3478.24. Decent and well earned. But the World Pool exacta came in at a mouth-watering £5369.60. ¡Ay, caramba!
Below is the full CSF/exacta 'tale of the tape' from last year's Royal meeting. I've rounded the computer straight forecast (CSF) and exacta dividends to the nearest pound, and in the final column have displayed a ratio of exacta to CSF. For example, in the Queen Anne, the opening race on Tuesday, the Exacta (313) paid 2.63 times as much as the CSF (119). Most notably, from 35 races, only three paid more on the bookie version of the 1-2 bet. And the average uplift was around 77% in favour of the World Pool exacta. I'll be playing these next week. It won't be easy but there's enough reward to justify the risk...
The placepot (find a placed horse in the first six races) and jackpot (find the first six winners) bets are not part of World Pool per se, but the place variant is an extremely liquid pool during Royal Ascot. Indeed, last year at the meeting the placepot pool was greater than half a million pounds on each of the five days. Dividends ranged from a relatively paltry £93.70 on Tuesday to an impossible-sounding £36,284.30 on Saturday. In the middle, on Gold Cup day, there was a gettable £1,244.80 payout.
A lot of my personal play will be in the multi-race pools, mainly placepot but the Tuesday card can often lend itself to a bold jackpot tilt. Of course, I'll be using Tix, the staking optimisation tool I built with my good friend Nigel Dove (who also built much of the geegeez racecard and form tool ecosystem).
With Tix you choose a unit stake, budget and the pool you want to play (Ascot placepot for example).
Then you pick your horses in each leg, adding them to either A, B or C ('A' being your strong fancies, 'B' warm fancies, and 'C' dark horses). You can have just 'A' picks if you like, and/or any combination of A's, B's and C's across the six legs.
Once you've done that, it's on to the TICKETS tab to decide which combo's you're playing and whether you want any multipliers. I almost always set mine up like this:
When you're happy with everything, hit PLACE ALL BETS (or you can place tickets individually).
You can then review your placed bets and download them to a spreadsheet from the BETS tab:
Tix is a free tool, and winning tickets receive a 5% bonus payout. So if you're due £100 back, you'll get £105 into your tote account for bets placed through Tix.
It's often said about betting that you one needs to choose one's battles; but it is also essential to opt for the right battlefield to optimise winning chances. You don't need me to tell you that finding winners at Royal Ascot is difficult; it's one of the great wagering challenges of the year where good work on Tuesday afternoon can be a distant memory by Saturday evening, and vice versa. Every return counts, so it's crucial to get as much back in odds/dividend terms as possible (what you get back is directly proportionate to what you stake and that is of no consequence here).
Sadly, optimising returns, for many punters, is an epic fail. And, at the end of the day, or of a meeting like Royal Ascot, or of your punting accounting period, it can comfortably be the difference between winning and losing.
In that somewhat preachy (sorry) spirit:
- if you can get concessions with traditional bookmakers, DO!
- win dividends are typically best on the exchanges
- exacta and trifecta dividends are generally MILES better with World Pool
- certain jockeys and trainers - those known to overseas punters - are 'caution advised' in the pools
Bring it on!
p.s. Don't forget to check out Tix, not just for the big meetings but for jackpot, placepot, quadpot, Placepot7 and Scoop6 bets, too. Start betting smarter with Tix here >
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Shaquille_JulieCamacho_CommonwealthCup2023_RoyalAscot.jpg320830Matt Bisognohttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngMatt Bisogno2024-06-13 16:59:142024-06-14 08:15:44Taking on the World at Royal Ascot
By the time you read this, Royal Ascot will be just days away, writes David Renham. It is one of my favourite meetings of the year, and I am guessing that will be the same for many readers. In this article, I will delve into Royal Ascot data going back 15 years (2009-2023) in preparation for the upcoming festival. Any profit/loss has been calculated to Industry SP, but I will quote Betfair SP where appropriate. My focus will be exclusively on Royal Ascot's mile handicap races.
There are four one mile handicaps scheduled for this year’s meeting: the Royal Hunt Cup, Britannia, Sandringham, and the relatively new Kensington Palace. The first three are run on the straight course; the Kensington Palace transpires on the round course. These races tend to have big fields, especially the straight-track ones. Going back to 2009, 41 of the 49 mile handicaps at the Royal meeting have seen at least twenty runners go to post. Only one of these took place on the round course.
Market Rank
Firstly, let us look at the performance of different positions in the market. Any ‘joints’ have been combined, so when it says ‘favourites’, it includes joint favourites. I have added each way percentages as many punters bet each way in big field handicaps:
It is interesting to note how well favourites and second favourites have fared, scoring in 17 of the 49 races. This equates to winning 34.7% of the races from just 8.7% of the total runners. If you focused on clear favourites, their results improved to 9 wins from 43 (SR 20.9%) for a profit of £6.75 (ROI +15.7%). Betting to BSP would have slightly improved matters to +£10.02 (ROI +23.3%). From a place perspective, it certainly looks worth considering putting either the favourite or second favourite in any placepot perm.
Horses outside the top ten in the betting have a poor record, as you would expect. Big-priced winners will occasionally pop up, but losses of over 65p in the £ for these outsiders do not inspire me too much to look beyond the more obvious. The biggest-priced winner has been 40/1 (Rising Star in the Kensington Palace in 2022), and she is the only winner from 357 horses that have started 40/1 or bigger.
Race Type Last Time Out (LTO)
Looking at the type of race these runners ran in last time out has uncovered a potential edge as the table below shows:
Horses that contested a handicap last time have a much better record than those who raced in a non-handicap. Regarding Betfair SP returns, LTO handicap runners lost less than 1p in the £, while LTO non-handicap runners lost a whopping 53p in the £.
Beaten Distance Last Time Out
My next port of call is to look at LTO performance, focusing on how far horses were beaten. The graph below looks first at the win strike rate (LTO winners are grouped with horses that were beaten less than a length):
Winners/horses beaten less than a length LTO have certainly got the better of the ‘battle’ from a win strike rate perspective. How does that equate to returns to SP? Here are those findings:
We see a good correlation here with the previous graph—losses of around 13p in the £ for LTO winners/horses beaten less than a length. In fact, at BSP, this 13% loss became a 12.5% profit. In contrast, there have been enormous losses for horses that were beaten one or more lengths in that most recent spin.
Finally, for this section, a look at the A/E indices:
There is a further positive correlation here, and all the data gathered points to keeping a close eye on any LTO runner that won or ran the winner to less than a length.
Market Rank LTO
Whenever I am interested in backing a horse, I always look back at their last run's price or market position. Indeed, personally, I often look at their previous three or four races in terms of odds/market rank. Hence, I thought seeing what I could find for these Ascot races would be worthwhile. Here are my findings:
As you can see, the percentage play is to be backing horses in the top five of the betting LTO rather than those 6th or higher on their most recent outing. They are better value; they have more chance of winning and more chance of getting placed. Regarding BSP returns, horses first to fifth in the betting last time would have lost you 13p in the £, and those 6th+ would have stung you for 41p in the £.
Draw Position
The draw in big field straight course races at Royal Ascot has been discussed in past articles, including this one. Arguably, it can be the most important factor, especially if one section of the track seems to be at a significant disadvantage. Here is some draw analysis of the last nine Royal Ascot straight track mile handicap races, covering the years 2021 to 2023:
Taking all nine races in combination, a draw in the top half (middle to high) has tended to be favoured.
There are other big field handicaps run at the meeting, including the Wokingham over 6f and the Buckingham Palace raced over 7f. Last year, both these races displayed a higher draw bias, so taking these two races in conjunction with the three mile straight track handicaps, you have to conclude that higher draws generally held sway at the 2023 Royal meeting.
What will happen this year? Well, that is the 64-million-dollar question. Only time will tell...
Running Style
Onto an area that is finally starting to get more attention from the racing press, and it is one I have been championing and studying for a long time. For this section, I have focussed on the forty 1-mile handicaps with the most extensive fields (20+) run on the straight course, contested between 2009 and 2023.
21 of the 40 races (52.5%) were won by a horse that was held up early in the race. Hold-up horses account for 36% of all the runners, so they have won around 1.45 times more than they statistically should. It should also be noted that hold-up horses have been twice as likely to get placed compared to prominent runners.
I thought comparing the Percentage of Rivals Beaten (PRB) for all running styles in these 20 runner+ straight course races would be useful. Here are the splits:
Based on the data shared previously, it is no surprise to see hold-up horses comfortably doing best.
As we have already seen, these races contain plenty of big-priced runners/outsiders, so below I have narrowed down the run style data and homed in on those runners that started at 20/1 or shorter. Did the PRB figures project a similar trend? Here are the splits:
We see the same pattern as before. Hence, looking at both sets of figures, the ‘ideal’ type will be a horse that comes from off the pace and delivers a challenge late, be it from a position near the back early or from a more midfield sit.
**
Summary
These big field mile handicaps certainly seem to have some general trends that we can apply to all four races. This is even though all four have differences (e.g. sex of runners, age restrictions, etc). In terms of the general trends, favourites and second favourites perform above expectations; last time winners or those beaten less than a length have proved much better value than those beaten LTO by one length or more; horses that ran in a handicap LTO have outperformed those that ran previously in a non-handicap; horses that were in the top five of the betting LTO are better betting propositions than those who were 6th or bigger in the betting.
As regards the big field straight course handicaps, we can add that a higher draw has been preferable recently, but it is important to keep an open mind. In terms of run style, the winners will typically race mid-pack or towards the back early.
-DR
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/RoyalAscot_marco.jpg320839Dave Renhamhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngDave Renham2024-06-10 18:02:332024-06-10 18:02:33Statistical Guide to Royal Ascot 2024 Mile Handicaps
What happens when a self-confessed journeyman trainer suddenly gets the opportunity to go to the sales, armed with the sort of hitherto undreamed-of financial backing to make him a candidate for the best prospects on offer?
That was the situation suddenly presented to Conrad Allen, 36 years a trainer and, apart from three years when resident senior handicapper for racing in Qatar, between 2009 and 2011, a man who has sent out winners every year since 1987, writes Tony Stafford.
Now though, the Breeze-up season was his target as new investor Ify Madueke excitedly looked through the catalogues first for the Craven, then Goffs at Doncaster and, lastly, the Guineas breeze back at HQ.
Ify is the father of Chelsea’s exciting January signing Noni, at £26.5 million one of the club’s less expensive buys in that explosive and excessive January window. Noni is a 21-year-old English player of Nigerian heritage, but one who had nurtured his skill and reputation over three years with PSV in Holland.
Not everyone has been overjoyed at Chelsea’s spending but for Conrad, 63, an avowed Spurs fan who grew up in nearby Edmonton, it has meant a new client coming literally from out of the blue.
“There was no joy for us at the Craven when prices were astronomical for anything I liked, but I picked out two at Goffs the following week.
“I loved the Twilight Son filly, who came up first. Ify said he would go to 200k for her. Unfortunately Richard Brown also liked her, and he got her for 360 grand – we were underbidders at 350! She is now called Beautiful Diamond and won very easily first time for Karl Burke.
“Undeterred, an hour later we were in for a Dark Angel filly, but again there was plenty of competition, Andrew Balding securing her for £340,000. She has had two runs and was a good second in the Hilary Needler at Beverley on Saturday,” he rued.
So now it was down to the least prestigious of the three, the Guineas breeze. Happily, trainer, new owner, and advisor Jim Lovat, a vastly experienced racing man who had been an owner with horses at a high level with former trainer Jeremy Noseda, got their filly. Lovat had owned High Havens Stables when Conrad trained from there for ex-footballer and broadcaster Alan Brazil.
“She was a small, active, typical breeze-up horse, by Cotai Glory and we got her for 65,000 guineas. We also bought a second filly, a daughter of US Navy Flag, who will take much more time.
“From the kick-off, Princess Chizara, named after the owner’s daughter, was quick, and leading up to her debut at Brighton last week, I called Ify and told him I wanted a jockey who was prepared to come to ride her here. That would rule out all the top boys and asked him for Darragh Keenan, brave and very much a horseman.”
The Brighton race was a four-runner affair with a long odds-on shot, three second places on his book. He was Mashadi, a 265,000 guineas yearling purchase trained by Richard Hannon for Amo Racing. As Conrad relates, “Our filly was going down to the start with her head in Darragh’s face and for quite a while behind the stalls it looked as though she might refuse to load. Fortunately, Darragh showed his horsemanship, and the starter was patient with her.”
Headed from the gate for a few strides by the favourite, Princess Chizara then took off, led inside the first furlong, and was never passed thereafter, drawing away to win impressively by almost five lengths in quick time. “Now we must go to Ascot. It was slightly annoying when the coverage on Sky Sports Racing suggested it unusual for me to have a nice juvenile. For much of my training career I would spec ten to 15 juveniles every year, with Harry Beeby of Doncaster sales urging me (and everyone else) on. If I told him I didn’t have any money, he’d say, “Pay for them when you sell them.” That was fine if they were any good, but when they weren’t, you couldn’t sell them and then had to keep them and be stuck with them.
“As I grew older and wiser, I stopped doing that and as you become part of the furniture, new trainers come along. People stop sending horses to you. I recall one example. My wife Bobbie worked as a secretary/assistant to Dana Brudenell-Bruce, daughter of Stanhope Joel (brother of Jim) and sister of Solna Thomson Jones, owners of Snailwell Stud and therefore major breeders.
“Once every month Bobbie used to drive Dana to the races and this day we went up to Beverley together where I had a winner. On our way back she said: “We are going to send some yearlings to young James Fanshawe who is going to start training, to help him.” He had been assistant to Michael Stoute. I knew then, coming as I did from Edmonton, I just wasn’t the right type for these established owner-breeders, and I haven’t been proved wrong since either.
“It was a total fluke that I ended up in racing. As a young child, I spent much of my early days in the company of actors as my father had been in the original cast of Half A Sixpence with Tommy Steele. We moved to New York when the show moved to Broadway, but when my parents split up, we came back to North London. My mother used her contacts in the business to get me loads of work in 1960’s TV adverts, such as Rice Krispies, Bisto and Vosene. I also went for the role of Oliver Twist in the film of Oliver but didn’t get it!
“That convinced me that acting wasn’t for me and the options for a young man from a one-parent family in those days were three-fold, an apprenticeship, in a bank or the Army. I chose banking and for two years I built up experience, soon showing I had the acumen for finance. The people I worked with were mainly very much older and with deaths, retirements and my own progress, promotion was rapid.
“But I had been attracted to horse racing as my grandfather had been a bookmaker and earlier as I had been looking for a challenge, I had decided to go to the local stables and begin riding. At first, I found it difficult, but I was determined to rise to the challenge, so I was soon offering to help at the Trent Park stables in North London in exchange for lessons.
“This continued alongside working in the bank and when I said I wanted to leave, I was assured I could come back when I wished. But one bank manager suggested, as I had improved my riding, to apply to become a jockey.
“We wrote to six trainers and got six job offers. I chose Tim Moloney at Melton Mowbray. At 18, I was older than the other apprentices and at the same time, I took out a mortgage and bought my first house.
“I had three ambitions, to ride in a race, to compete against Lester Piggott, and to partner a winner; and it took me until 21 to achieve all three. After working as a lad for Harry Wragg, I then rode as back-up to Philip Robinson with Mick Ryan. In those days, apprentices lost their claim through age, unlike nowadays, so once I lost mine, after one win as a fully-fledged jockey, I stopped there and then.
“I then took a livery yard at Brinkley, taking people’s broken-down horses and bringing them back to racing fitness. Eventually one contact asked me to accommodate an Anglo-Arab and train her. I had no idea what to do, but finally agreed and we took the horse to Goodwood for an Arabian race. When I saw the opposition, mostly looking like horses straight out of the field, I got rather more confident, and the filly won.
“It was a short step then to training and, by late 1987, I had a licence, never having enough money to buy into the top level but always sufficient contacts to keep the show going. I will, sadly to my mind, forever be known as the man who trained the first-ever winner on a UK all-weather track, and that was a total fluke!
“I thought the first day of all-weather was something to aim at, and entered two horses for the claimer, at Lingfield Park on October 30, 1989, which was due off as the third race. In the end, with multiple divisions, one of ours, Niklas Angel was in the first of 12 races on the card and won the race at 11 a.m.
“Continuing my investing in property, I bought Shadowfax Stables, building up to around 30 horses, with the help of a couple of important owners, who brought in many investors.
“We were the forerunners in stable sponsorship but when both men died from cancer within a short time of each other, the people they had brought in also melted away. From 25 horses, suddenly I was down to four.
“I had sold my yard and asked Charlie McBride – formerly my assistant – if I could move them to him and that I would ride them out for free. I had been planning to go to the US to train, but first I resolved to clear all my debt with vets, feed and the other outstanding costs of running a racing yard.
“Then one day, Michael Fenton, the handicapper, not the jockey, and a friend of Charlie’s, asked had I thought of becoming a handicapper?
“I said, of course not, I’m a trainer.” He said “Exactly, you act as a handicapper every day of the week,” telling me Qatar wanted a handicapper. They would fly me out there, pay me $8,000 a month, find me accommodation and a car.
“I got the job simply because of Michael’s recommendation and because I told them I could do it. Soon I was travelling around the world attending all the international handicappers’ meetings in Hong Kong, Dubai and Paris and conferences in Sydney, Paris again and Tokyo.
“I could have stayed longer but it was really like a paid prison sentence, so I decided to come back. I did keep my Qatari contacts and trained for them, but it wasn’t something that could be relied upon over any length of time.”
Here I can make my own small intervention. As Conrad told me at the time, if I wanted the job, he could probably arrange it for me. Another opportunity spurned in my life of missed chances? Possibly.
It was over the past couple of years, as he had been chugging along quite happily, that Conrad was made an introduction by Martin Dwyer that has undoubtedly led to this new phase in his career’s becoming possible.
“Martin had become friendly with a young businessman he had been riding for, who had been very successful in the building industry. Having initially started owning a few horses, he rapidly developed a vision of owning 100 within a few years.
“His name was Simon Lockyer, but at the time we were introduced, he had over-invested with his previous trainers and needed a drastic cutting back. He told me he wanted to send me 38 horses. I had 18 boxes at my yard in Hamilton Road, but with access to a similar number further up the road in a livery/spelling yard.
“I said I would take eight, and we chipped away, and he said this was the first time a trainer had ever recommended he reduce rather than increase his string. We were left with a manageable number of horses that were not only money-spinners at their level, but proved to the business that given the right material I could get results. None of those we discarded ever gave cause to regret those decisions. Unfortunately, Simon, of whom I have a high regard, has had to withdraw from racing for now, but I hope his wish one day to return on a more realistic scale, can be in partnership with me.
“Several of the remaining horses were quickly sold, and crucially, in the case of Tyger Bay, a share went to Middleham Park. Now, as he has done so well, we have Incrimination for them with the promise of another to come.
“But more importantly, when Ify Madueke wanted advice on which trainer to employ, Jim Lovat recommended me. As we stood in the winners’ enclosure at Brighton on Friday, Jim said: “At least now you know you’re a good judge.” I replied, I’ve always been a good judge, but I’ve never had the money to back it up.” He smiled and said, “You have now!”
“Princess Chizara is all speed, so the choice is whether to stay with the fillies in the Queen Mary, probably including Beautiful Diamond, or take on the boys in the Windsor Castle. All those years ago when we had a Queen Mary filly in Toocando I’m sure I went the wrong path taking on Lyric Fantasy. Next time out we were was second to future 1,000 Guineas winner Sayyedati In the Cherry Hinton at Newmarket.
“It’s great to have that sort of discussion to look forward to after all these years,” he said.
- TS
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/PrincessChizara.jpg320830Tony Staffordhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngTony Stafford2023-06-12 07:25:222023-06-12 11:17:17Monday Musings: Conrad Allen – A Life in Racing
My name is David Massey and, after meeting Matt at Ascot recently, I'm delighted to be bringing you the odd tale from my travels around the country. As many of you know, as well as doing some writing with my old sparring partner Mr Delargy, I also enjoy my time working for a few of the books on-course in the summer. It's essentially the nearest thing I get to exercise these days, and if you think that's stretching a point, I invite you to try and hump a load of bookmaking kit from Car Park 6 to the Queen Anne Enclosure at Royal Ascot as the mercury hits 25 at nine in the morning. It works a couple of bacon sandwiches off, I'm pretty sure.
Thank the Lord I was working in the shade of the stands all week, though, as those in the Windsor Enclosure cooked like lobsters for the latter part of the meeting. I do not work well in sunshine, as a recent dose of sunstroke at Epsom on Oaks Day will testify (threw up on return to the hotel at 6pm, passed out on the bed, woke four hours later to a text asking if I wanted anything bringing back from Nando's - I can tell you now that eating peri-peri chicken at that point made as much appeal as getting out of the car park at Worcester) and so to be front row in the Queen Anne Enclosure for the week was a real joy.
I'm not really here to tell you about all the bets we take week to week, more the stories and the people I meet along the way. That said, I will point out the more interesting/strange bets we’ve taken, and that starts right here, right now, with the Queen Anne.
There weren't any money-buyers around willing to take the 1-6 Baaeed but there were plenty of ladies wanting a fiver each-way on him. Now, as a frontman, it is not my job to advise, merely to smile, be polite and take the money, so I do not put anyone off their bets. We take six such wagers, all of whom are delighted to collect their one pound and four pence profit afterwards.
Business is steady rather than spectacular. We've one bloke betting rags, he picks up a decent chunk from his £20 each-way on Acklam Express at 150-1 in the Kings Stand, and immediately has fifty each-way of it back on Lusail in the St James's Palace, falling just a head away from the jackpot. Suffice to say, he's having a good day.
I'm working for the S&D firm all week, with Rob the boss and Jason running the book. Rob is on the rail with his partner Vanessa, and business there is about a third of what we are doing. Not even Rob's top hat and tails can pull the crowds in. The rest of Tuesday passes by without a whimper, business overall about half of what it ought to be.
We're staying in Windsor all week, with Rob renting a house for us, but we've come across the first problem. Jason and I are sharing a room for the first two days (Jason is then off to Newmarket to run the book there) but the room is snug, to say the least, and there's no way we can fit the second bed in without falling over each other. It's decided the best thing to do is for Jason to book himself in at Heathrow Premier Inn whilst he's down here, and I get the room to myself. That sounds terrific, but as Jason points out, he now gets a ready-made cooked breakfast every morning, whereas I've got cereal to look forward to. I'm not sure who's getting the best end of this deal, to be honest.
What I can tell you is the new black shoes I’ve bought for the week have made my heel bleed, so they get sacked off, and I return to my battered, but comfy, brown ones for the rest of the meeting. I really ought to have bedded them in. Let this be a lesson, kids.
Wednesday sees us betting in the same position as Tuesday, which I'm also grateful for, and it's a noticeably younger crowd. That means asking for quite a few IDs (they all have them, I'm delighted to say) and it also means a few lads, with a fair bit of ale down them in hot weather, milling around in front of us. They've all got massive cigars. Some of them are even lit. They move off and stand in front of the joint next to us, good news for us but bad news for Richard, running the Liles Bet pitch. We have a chat and decide it's going to kick off at some point, and I reckon it'll be after race five. It turns out I'm better at predicting fight times than I am at what's going to win on the day, as the oh-so-predictable scrap takes place after the Hunt Cup. The one security lady in the ring watches on, wisely not getting involved.
Business is again well down, about 40% on pre-Covid levels. We've two ladies betting with us that are very pleasant but haven't a clue what to back. Liam (my co-worker) and I give the best advice we can, and we somehow manage to fathom a winner or two for them. One of them has some fancy cocktail to drink, which has the colour and consistency of cough medicine. I ask her how much it set her back, only to find the answer is "nothing" as she's got hospitality this afternoon and work are paying! I ask if she could possibly bring Liam and me a cold drink down, as it's really warm. When she comes back with two pints for us five minutes later, they are greeted with a cheer as if the Queen herself has had a winner.
Thursday sees us betting next to Rob Waterhouse, the, ahem, colourful Aussie bookmaker. They're all in top hats, I'm in a pink shirt. Couldn't look more different if we tried. Ironically, the friendliest punter we have all day is an Aussie, who we know as Peter, as he's a friend of Liam and myself now. I ask him why he's not betting with his fellow countryman, and the reply I get is not suitable for a family column. If I left the expletives out, he said nothing at all. In fact, he makes his opinions loudly known, and I suspect that may well be for the benefit of next door as much as us.
Pete's an absolute gem, full of stories from around the world, where he's been racing, who he's met, the whole time littering his stories with ribald jokes, and he has us in stitches. This is what I love about this job: meeting new people, making new friends. You don't do that sitting in an office. He's here with an Aussie racing tour, and although he'll miss Friday, he tells us he will be back Saturday - in the Royal Enclosure. We look forward to his return in top hat and tails. More so than he does, actually.
There's two women betting with us, sisters from Hertfordshire, they tell us. One likes me (“aren’t you polite?”) so much after a few cocktails (and winners) that I get a marriage proposal. This is both lovely and unexpected, but I tell her I have to work tomorrow.
As it is with Baaeed, so it is with the long odds-on Reach For The Moon, as the ladies all come with their fiver each-ways for Frankie. I sometimes think Frankie could ride something called Neddy, fresh off the lunchtime shift from Blackpool beach at Ascot, and we’d still take money for him. This time, the ladies knew, as Frankie can only finish second, and the each-way backers have the last laugh.
We eat in a pub in nearby Datchet that night, but it's clear all is not well with Rob, who is complaining he's feeling poorly. He pushes his pie around with a fork for five minutes before announcing he's not hungry. This is almost unprecedented. Rob likes his food like, well, I like my food, so to see him leave a near-full plate is a rare sight. We quickly work out from his symptoms that he's also now got sunstroke. Back to the digs, get some water down him, and he's asleep within five minutes. Next morning he's up at half five, counting the money. He's clearly feeling better.
Friday. The temperature is rising, and so is business. It's clear within ten minutes of setting up that it's going to be a lot busier. Rob is now in charge of the book, with Jason off to Newmarket. The only consistent thing about Rob is his inconsistency. As Jason says before he leaves for Newmarket, "we're either going to break level on the week, or win thirty grand." I think that sums Rob up beautifully.
It is typical that, on what turns out to be our busiest day, the results go completely against us. The punters are smashing us to bits. After Inspiral wins the Coronation, I run out of money, and have to go and get another float. Surely we can get a result in the Sandringham? We cannot, and Heredia is another disaster. One guy, who started the day having £40 on the first winner, has kept playing it up and is drawing £700 here. £500 goes straight back on Changingoftheguard. Grand Alliance has him beat all ways up before he decides to go for a wander late on. It's a bloodbath. They're carrying some of the bookmakers out on stretchers. The first four bets for the last come in, and all four are on Latin Lover. I tell Liam to shorten the price. It makes no difference. I cannot get them off it, no matter how much we take and keep shortening it. The payout queue is long, very long. Not as long as it is at Waterhouse's though. "Is this the queue for the boat rides?" shouts one wag as he walks past.
We eat at the house that night, having ordered Dominos. Rob wolfs his down, clearly back on form, retires to the sofa, and starts watching poker videos (he plays, and very well, I’m told) on his phone. Vanessa looks at me. “Ten minutes” she says, and she’s wrong by around two minutes, as it takes just eight of them for Rob to fall asleep.
Finally, we reach Saturday. As things stand. we've got the expenses for the week and have today to make a profit. We're all absolutely knackered by this point, this week really does take it out of you, and you have to have one last push to get you over the line. Thankfully, it's a bit cooler today - indeed, there's a shower or two around in the morning, which is very welcome - and believe me, that really does help you when you're on your last legs.
After meeting an old friend in Lisa, who I used to work with back in Skegness during my Our Price days (yes, that far back) we get betting around 1pm. Again, this feels busier. It's been a week of two halves, the latter much more like pre-Covid times than the former.
"How are you pair of bloody degenerates doing?" Pete's back, in his best, and he tells us he's in a box with Gai Waterhouse, Rob’s wife. He's got the photos to prove it, too. "She's a lot nicer than he is." He has a bet, a fiver each-way Rohaan in the Wokingham. Not only a lovely bloke, but a decent bloke, is Peter. He picks up and says his final goodbyes. A genuinely sad moment, we've enjoyed his company.
And then, after a week of warm, sunny weather, comes the rain. It's absolutely ferocious. None of us were prepared for this, and none of us have a coat. Heather, Liam's girlfriend, is working with us and she has just her summer dress on. Liam, the git, refuses to give his jacket up for her and it's left to me to do the chivalrous thing. At least I have a long-sleeved shirt on, but it's not helping. The wind has whipped up and it's like working at Newmarket on Cesarewitch day. I'm absolutely soaked by the time the Ascot Ces, the Queen Alexandra, comes around. Someone has £200 ew Reshoun at 20s with me and with half a furlong to go, I'm thinking I might need to go and fetch some money. But no, here's Buick and Stratum to save the day.
The only good thing is, the rain abates just in time to pack up. We all get paid for the week - the Saturday results have been good, and I rather liked Naval Crown anyway, so Rob kept that for himself - and there are top-ups for all. We say our goodbyes, knowing that we'll all meet again at Southwell on Monday.
- DM
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/bettingring_goodwood.jpg319830David Masseyhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngDavid Massey2022-07-07 07:39:092022-07-07 07:47:46Roving Reports: Royal Ascot
A lot has changed in three years, writes Tony Stafford. Yes, it’s that long since I’ve been to Royal Ascot and it won’t be the same with different allegiances and in some ways different means of getting there.
Over the interim with first Covid and its continued effects – my younger daughter contracted it for the first time last week but seems well enough, thankfully – its impact and threat was never far away.
But what has changed is that I’ve succumbed to the era of the satellite in the sky that guides the car through traffic pitfalls, a practice insisted upon when my wife is travelling with me; never mind that I’ve been just about everywhere!
It’s then hard to shrug it off. I’ve known all the possible ways to Ascot, ducking through Windsor Great Park, sliding away from the track, and going through the same village that the Royal party uses to reach the straight mile, with the bunting put out every year by some of Her Majesty’s most loyal subjects.
Alan and Harry have since made alternate arrangements having been at the last “faux” Ascot I missed. I think it was on my time before last when I might easily have subjected them to a police incident. There are two possible roads after that village street to turn down which take you alongside the start of the Royal Hunt Cup course. I slid in the first one, past a gun-toting police representative and was immediately confronted at the end of the immaculate gravel drive by the sight of the gates at the top of the straight.
It was a couple of hours before the Royal party would be decamping from the horse-drawn carriages into the limousines to cover exactly the same ground.
I did a quick about-turn; making a shame-faced soundless apology to the official. He by then was starting to take more appropriate attention to the potential threat posed by three men in their 70’s. Mouth wide open, he left us to re-join the correct route a hundred yards further on.
I’m not sure, travelling alone, I will venture anywhere near that approach to the track, but it always got us there quicker than the ‘tourist’ ways in. Resuming after five decades of going to Ascot will be just as thrilling as the 2000 Guineas and Derby have already been this year. I just hope this most British of sporting events proves to have lost nothing in the missing years for me.
Nowadays we have the benefit of 48-hour declarations, so we know the make-up of the seven-race opening card. Getting to Ascot by road is always a delicate balance, and with the start time now back to 2.30 p.m. and a 6.10 final race, travelling up every day will be a challenging and gruelling process.
If you want to arrive in time to get a trouble- and traffic-free approach, probably 11 a.m. might not be too early. I’m sure the track’s management will be delighted if everyone has a few hours to sample the (very expensive) catering on offer.
But then, it is Ascot. Going racing isn’t cheap in the UK. One northern track the other day was charging £20 a head – plus the obligatory £3 for a programme. I wonder how many first-time attendees there will hurry back. Maybe if they backed a few winners they might?
Winner-backing is what racing is all about and, while elsewhere on this site there will be comprehensive analysis of all the races over the five days in one article or another, I’ll restrict myself to this first card which is nicely varied with a balance of top-class contests and tricky handicaps. Also, it’s nice to know what’s actually going to run.
Everyone will hope to have got all the preliminaries – and whether that will include a Royal procession involving herself, I have yet to hear – over well in time for the first race appearance of the potential number one equine star of the week, William Haggas’ Baaeed.
Although it will have been only a year and a week since the colt made his debut as a three-year-old in a novice event at Newbury, he has progressed with such sure-footedness that in seven unbeaten runs he has gone to the top of the international racing tree.
The Shadwell Estates colours may have become a little less prominent than they were before the death of Sheikh Hamdan Al-Maktoum, but Baaeed is on the way to becoming perhaps the most illustrious to carry the blue and white silks over the more than 40 years’ involvement he had with the sport, in the UK initially, and then worldwide.
His family have inevitably slimmed down the size of the Shadwell operation, but rarely can a cull have resulted in such a positive impact on other owners and trainers. Horses that would normally have been in training for Sheikh Hamdan have been sold to race, along with beautifully bred fillies and mares passed on to other paddocks. This will enable smaller-scale owners and breeders to have access to horses that would otherwise never have come on the market.
But for as long as the family has a horse of the quality of Baaeed to represent it I’m sure it will be an honour to continue the founder’s tradition. Baaeed will be long odds-on and I’d like to see a performance of Frankel magnitude and magnificence. I think Baaeed is the nearest we’ve seen to that unbeaten champion.
A more recent death will continue to have a major impact on the Haggas family as Maureen, the trainer’s wife, is the elder daughter of Lester Piggott, who passed in the lead-up to the Derby.
Not content with nine wins in the premier Classic, Lester also rode a preposterous 116 Royal Ascot winners, starting in the 1952 Wokingham with Malka’s Boy when a 16-year-old. College Chapel in the 1993 Cork and Orrery Stakes (now Platinum Jubilee Stakes) completed the set. That haul was all the more impressive given the meeting was then staged over only four days, with Saturday being merely ‘Ascot Heath’.
Ascot 2022 will start with a bang early on Tuesday afternoon and continue in like fashion right through to Saturday evening. Sprinters are to the fore in the King’s Stand Stakes, nowadays also a Group 1 contest but over the minimum five furlongs, a furlong shorter than the Jubilee. Here the home team are promised another potential roasting from some overseas greats, human and equine.
Wesley Ward has long been a devotee of the Royal meeting, most often with his fast juveniles and older sprinters, and he brings four-year-old Golden Pal – impossible to beat at home but twice defeated in the UK, by a neck as a two-year-old at Ascot and last year when only seventh at York in Winter Power’s Nunthorpe.
That Tim Easterby filly will be back tomorrow to challenge him again, but they may both have to take special care of the threat posed by Australia’s greatest trainer, Chris Waller. His seven-year-old, Nature Strip, has won 20 of 37 career starts in Australia and has earnings that will pass £10 million if he wins tomorrow.
Between the opener and the King’s Stand, there’s an intriguing contest for the Group 2 Coventry Stakes. This is the premier juvenile contest of the week and, such is the level of competition that 15 of the 16 declared have already won races, with seven of them unbeaten.
Until his third race there was very little suggestion that Blackbeard, a son of No Nay Never trained by Aidan O’Brien, was held in particularly high regard.
But then, as the second favourite to even-money shot Tough Talk in the Marble Hill Stakes on the Curragh, he put the favourite away by more than three lengths and now heads the Coventry market. With so many of the Ballydoyle two-year olds winning first time out, fears of an almost Cheltenham-like monopoly might be imminent in the two-year-old races this week.
Meanwhile, Coroebus, the 2000 Guineas winner, is the day’s other star performer. It would be satisfying if Charlie Appleby’s Classic winner could maintain his position at the top of the mile three-year-old colts’ totem pole.
In the old days we used to get nearly all the top-category races on the opening day with just the two-and-a-half mile Ascot Stakes (Handicap) as a diversion for form students at a more prosaic level – in other words people like me! I’d love to see Reshoun win it again, but here I offer my suggestion for a value bet. Surrey Gold has never raced beyond one mile and three-quarters but Hughie Morrison has campaigned him as though there will be more to come. I believe there will.
It's a great day all round, but if you need Wednesday to Saturday information (as well as more detail for Tuesday), Matt Bisogno and the team will put you straight. I’ll be too busy taking it all in!
- TS
https://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/WilliamRoyalAscot.jpg320830Tony Staffordhttps://www.geegeez.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/geegeez_banner_new_170x78.pngTony Stafford2022-06-13 05:09:502022-06-13 07:12:10Monday Musings: A Royal Return
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