Queen Anne Stakes Tips: Improving Fox Chairman is fancied

The milers took it in turns to beat each other last season, with no outstanding performer in the division. It, therefore, makes sense to look towards the unexposed, potential improvers in the field, and Fox Chairman fits the bill at around the 8/1 mark.

Fox Chairman was unraced as a juvenile but the son of Kingman showed plenty of promise in four starts last season, improving with each run and landing a listed race over a mile and a quarter at Newbury on his final outing of the campaign.

That Newbury success followed good placed efforts in the Dee Stakes at Chester behind Circus Maximus and in the Hampton Court Stakes at this meeting, experiencing no luck in running on either occasion. With only four starts to his name, Fox Chairman remains open to plenty of improvement, while the excellent form of trainer Andrew Balding is another factor in his favour.

Circus Maximus, the colt who beat Fox Chairman at Chester, won two Group 1s last season, including on the round course here in the St James’s Palace Stakes, and he heads the market. This stiffer track should suit Circus Maximus better than Santa Anita where he was fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Mile on his final start last year, and he is respected for trainer Aidan O’Brien, though looks short enough in the betting at 3/1.

Circus Maximus and Fox Chariman will be making their first start of the season at Ascot, though one horse who has already had a run is Lord North, who won the Group 3 Brigadier Gerard Stakes at Haydock on Sunday. He progressed rapidly last season, winning the Cambridgeshire and then finishing runner-up in the Balmoral Handicap off a 12 lb higher mark. He is another to consider if running here rather than the Prince of Wales's Stakes.

One Master finished a close-up third in last year's Queen Anne but a stiff mile looks an absolute maximum for a mare who put up a career-best effort when winning the seven-furlong Prix de la Foret at Longchamp for a second time. She even dropped back to six furlongs on her final start last year, finishing runner-up in the British Champions Sprint Stakes over this course.

Mustashry was one of the favourites for last year’s Queen Anne after beating many of the same rivals (including the eventual first two) in the Lockinge beforehand but he underperformed in seventh for no apparent reason. However, he confirmed himself better than ever at the age of six when dropping back to seven furlongs to win the Challenge Stakes at Newmarket under a penalty.

Escobar and Bless Him have won big handicaps over Ascot’s straight mile but are up in grade here, both having had pipe-openers in the listed race won in runaway fashion from the front by Marie’s Diamond at Newmarket last week. Escobar, representing Lord Glitters’ trainer David O’Meara,  won the Balmoral Handicap last October, a race Lord Glitters also won, while Bless Him, a former Britannia Handicap winner, was again successful over course and distance in the autumn.

Fox Chairman does not have form on the Ascot straight course – the Hampton Court is run over a mile and a quarter on the round course – but he does have plenty of untapped potential and doesn’t have much to find in a race which looks wide open.

Recommendation:

Back Fox Chairman in the Queen Anne Stakes