Radio
.jpg)
.png "Get £10 free credit to spend at Timeform.com")
Url copied to clipboard.
With two days down it’s a good time to take stock and the takeaways from the first two days at Royal are that the John & Thady Gosden training partnership are in fine form with doubles on each of the first two days, as are the O’Brien clan with Aidan and Joseph already having bagged six top-three placings between them.
Blue Point has two winners and a second from just three runners so far, the referee has already called a halt to the bout between high-profile big spenders Wathnan and Amo on grounds the contest has become too one-sided, while high draws have largely held sway on the straight course and horses ridden mid division or further back have been favoured with no winner yet to make all the running.
That last statistic will be music to the ears of supporters of crack French filly Zarigana who has won four of her five races, albeit passing the post first in only three of them after being awarded the French 1000 after Shes Perfect was demoted, having last year suffered a surprise defeat at the hands of her stable-companion Vertical Blue in the Prix Marcel Boussac, by the same margin (a nose), by which she lost out in the Guineas.
Behind her in the Boussac and taking her on again are Exactly (who was also behind her in the French 1000) and Simmering, on something of a retrieval mission after her latest Irish 1000 Guineas flop, and on paper it’s hard to see either of that pair reversing the form.
Defeats for Shes Perfect and Mandanaba in the French Oaks might suggest the French Guineas form is a bit suspect, but it was extremely hard to come from off the pace that day and crunching the official tracking data suggests that considering how far back she came from Zarigana did very well to get as close as she did at all and was arguably the best filly in the race by a couple of lengths.
That level of form is enough to make her the clear one to beat here but her price is short enough given not only the hard race she endured to get so close but the possibility that her rider Mickael Barzalona might well overdo the waiting tactics again.
Zarigana’s main market rival is the unbeaten Falakeyah who hosed up in a maiden at Wolverhampton last November and made short work of six rivals in the Pretty Polly at Newmarket among whom the third Qilin Queen has since come out and landed a listed contest herself, albeit somewhat fortuitously. The exuberance she showed that day when running her rivals into the ground may well have encouraged her connections to go back in trip rather than up for what might have looked her obvious target given her pedigree, the Oaks, and it’s worth remembering the straight ten furlongs at Newmarket is a very different test to the round mile at Ascot.
Clock-leading Fred Darling winner Duty First hasn’t reproduced that form since, while Irish Guineas third Cercene is probably better than that run suggests given she was set a fair bit to do, but I’ve fancied Kon Tiki for this since her win on the all-weather at Kempton in April and the booking of crack round course jockey William Buick is a bonus.
What was particularly impressive about that Kempton win was that she ran the penultimate furlong according to the tracking data 0.2 seconds faster than Cosmic Year managed when landing an even more steadily-run novice event over a furlong less half an hour later, and he, of course, came out best of the rest behind outstanding miler Field Of Gold in the Irish 2000 Guineas.
Kon Tiki has since won a listed race at York with subsequent French listed winner Troia back in third, setting that with a smart turn of foot too. The record of her trainer’s runners at the Royal meeting in the last few years the closest inspection too, with wins for Saffron Beach and Claymore and placed runs from Mill Stream and Intellogent.
Coronation Stakes day opens with the Albany Stakes which has attracted seventeen runners but which five – Green Sense, Signora, Fitzella, Ipanema Queen and Tahalel - stand out on the clock.
Fitzella, who scored easily, and Tahalel were first and second in a Haydock maiden run in a faster time (albeit far less frantically early) than the listed Cecil Frail won by subsequent King Charles II runner-up Frost At Dawn and clearly merit respect. The same applies to Ipanema Queen who might only have won an auction maiden on her only start so far at the Curragh but did so by five and a half lengths and it’s likely significant that the only other three juveniles to have done that since 2010 at six furlongs or less include the subsequent Coventry winner Arizona in 2020 and subsequent Queen Mary winner Quick Suzy in 2021, and neither of them managed it on their debut as she did either.
Green Sense won a Curragh maiden before finishing a three-quarter length second, with Signora back in third, to Lady Iman in the Group 3 Fillies Sprint at Naas and had she not had a setback Lady Iman would have started favourite for this.
I’m always sceptical when reading too much into the result of Irish juvenile races, however, not least one like this where Signora was only a length behind Green Sense and not the length and three quarters that appears in the form book, and looking at the ride that Signora received, tender after a slow start but impressing with how easily she made ground approaching the finish, while the first two fought out the race on the favoured far rail, I’m inclined to believe she’ll take a big step forward and reverse the form in style.
Shadow Of Light heads the weight-adjusted performance ratings in the Commonwealth Cup but, oddly, he’s yet to run a fast time and leader on this score, and by quite some way, is Babouche, from Whistlejacket. The pair get their figures from the Phoenix Stakes last year when Babouche came out on top by a length and a half, and they also met last time at Naas where Babouche increased that margin and away from the rail too that Whistlejacket raced against. Too keen when a beaten favourite for the Cheveley Park last year, she showed a smart turn of foot at Naas and looks the one to beat.
Hand Of God, who won the Golden Gates at this meeting last year but missed the rest of the season, is the one to beat on time in the Duke Of Edinburgh. He’s reunited with William Buick who rode him that day and isn’t a rider the stable usually call on, and there’s every chance given how stoutly bred he is he’ll improve for this first try at a mile and a half having had a pipeopener over an insufficient nine furlongs at Newmarket last month.
Miss Nightfall is 1lb behind clock-leading Silver Ghost in the Sandringham but would have beaten her comfortably at Goodwood last time had her rider Saffie Osborne not gone looking for a non-existent gap and the return to a straight track and reunion with Oisin Murphy who has been first and second on her the two times he’s ridden her will hopefully give her the edge.
Wimbledon Hawkeye and Amiloc head the time ratings in the King Edward but the former is starting to look exposed and I wasn’t enamoured by the latter’s racing style last time, on and off the bridle, in a contest in which fourth-placed Opportunity was badly hampered.
The Palace of Holyroodhouse isn’t my idea of a good betting medium but for those who do like it and want to know the three ‘best-ins’ on time they are Maw Lam, Hammer The Hammer and Englemere.
Recommendations
1pt win Signora in the 14.30 at Royal Ascot (Albany Stakes) at 11/4
1pt win Kon Tiki in the 16.20 at Royal Ascot (Coronation Stakes) at 7/1
.jpg&w=300)
.png "Get £10 free credit to spend at Timeform.com")
