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Everyone seems to know the score
The Gurkha’s 6/4
They just know, they're so sure
That England's Guineas doesn’t hold sway
Awtaad blew him away
But I know I won’t lay
Cos I remember
Three Lions of the Turf
Frankel, Kingman, Warning
Dirty foreign herd
Never stopped Brits roaring.
Our English jocks, so many sneers
Can’t match their Irish peers
So we’re told, through the years
But I still see that finish by Moore
And when Joe Mercer soared
Piggott belting the horse
Starkey’s brave dancing
Three Lions of the Turf
Frankel, Kingman, Warning
Dirty foreign herd
Never stopped Brits roaring.
Hikari p*ssed up by ten
But pounds sterling beats yen.
It's coming home
It's coming
Racing’s coming home.
I still haven’t worked out the difference between football and ‘tournament football’, the way certain pumped-up, pretentious pundits are now describing it, naming no names or Keowning no Keowns, but here we are again, embarking on a tournament, with the grey cloud of self-doubt hanging over the England team.
At least it’s only a Cumulonimbus this time rather than a Towering Cumulus, because part of the cloud has been borrowed by British racing, which could easily be getting an inferiority complex, given how the season has gone so far.
The mild paranoia comes from the fact that three of its four classics have gone the way of the Irish, including a 1-2-3 in the Derby, and the only lightning strikes – those moments of equine electricity – have been in France, one from an Irish Gurkha and the other by a Japanese warrior.
On Timeform ratings, just four of the top ten older horses in the world are British, while the best seven three-year-olds are from Ireland or America, the same two nations that dominate the betting for the juvenile events at Royal Ascot.
And then there’s the publicity problem. The ‘nice horse in a nice race’ stamp, used by 82% of our owners and trainers, doesn’t generate the same headlines as the catch-fire catchphrases from the kick-ass Americans or the audacious Aussies.
All of which means there’s no full English on the breakfast menu for the most full English of occasions, replaced by fancy croissants, punchy pancakes and finest soda bread.
Therefore, to address the balance, and to shake us from our sleeping-giant slumber, here’s a flag-waving, tub-thumping, lager-soaked rundown of the top ten points of pride and passion for all England fans going into Royal Ascot.
Irish-bred, Scottish-trained and Arab-owned, but why let the facts get in the way of some partisan politics? At least Yalta has raced on two English tracks and beaten seven English horses, barely enough of an examination to qualify for the Ascot academy, especially as he’s done it so easily from the front, but it’s because he’s done it so easily from the front that makes his timefigures so impressive. If he can run that fast in a drag race, imagine what he can do in a real race. That’s what makes him such a dangerous opponent for Caravaggio and co in the Coventry.
If Royal Ascot had an Olympics-style opening ceremony, Time Test would be the British flag-bearer. When everyone was still wetting themselves over A Shin Hikari, 48 hours later, Time Test quietly and assuredly picked up the oriental gauntlet, via a coming-of-age road at Sandown. There have been a few roadworks since he took this meeting by storm last year, but the Brigadier Gerard – in particular the last two furlongs – was like a driver spotting a ‘variable speed limit ends’ sign, pre-empting an overdue move through the gears. This is his time, and this time A Shin Hikari will face a real test, a real Time Test.
Race one, day one, and the point of focus for the Little Englander. We’ve got a North American Wonder Woman and a French Supermodel coming to play, so how can we compete with that? But Tepin is Lasix-less and stripless, and Ervedya hasn’t quite got the figure to match her CV; and then there’s the assumption that the Lockinge was a Championship of a Group 1, rather than the Premier League. But maybe it wasn’t. It’s unlikely that Belardo is going to face his kryptonite of fast ground, it’s likely that Limato will see the mile out better with that run behind him, and it’s even more likely that Kodi Bear will be a different proposition with the fizziness out of him. The closer the Queen Anne gets, the more we may see the Lockinge in a different light.
A record-breaking nine winners at last year’s Royal Ascot, and what was his reflective reaction? ‘I thought it was going to be ten.’ People who talk the most have the least to say. And his riding speaks for itself. He’s out on his own, he’s out of this world, and he’s British. Thank God he’s British.
When it’s not the Aussies it’s the Americans, but less so this year for the Royal Ascot sprints, partly as the raiding party isn’t what it has been, but also because our speedsters are a strong batch. Twilight Son gets the headline, for no greater reason than I have him stalked and have him backed, but, for once, Britain has strength in depth in the division, from Magical Memory and The Tin Man in the Diamond Jubilee to Profitable and Mecca’s Angel in the King’s Stand. And then there’s Quiet Reflection in the Commonwealth Cup, the three-year-old filly who prompted some quiet reflection of my own after a Morning Line remark that she was ‘bringing a knife to a gun fight’ in the Sandy Lane. Turns out it was a Crocodile Dundee-style knife, for which I was rightfully ribbed and shamed. Big knife, big filly, big engine, big rating, her 122 making her clear top with Timeform for the Commonwealth Cup, to stick it to Acapulco.
There’s not a lot of love around for Galileo Gold, whose Guineas win has been twice eclipsed, firstly by The Gurkha in France and then, more directly, by Awtaad in Ireland. But the Curragh was the Lord Mayor’s Show for one and the afterparty for the other, Galileo Gold finding himself in the wrong place in the wrong time both into the race and during it, having to fight his way up the inside, and the ground made it a home fixture for Awtaad in more ways than one. It’s understandable that Galileo Gold is the outsider of the three, but he shouldn’t be double the price of one and three-times the odds of the other, not when he’s put in the best time performance of them.
There’s nothing more British than a knighthood, and nothing more British than a knighthood for services to tourism in Barbados. It feels like a renaissance season for Stoute, but even during the leaner years he rarely missed in the Hardwicke, virtually making the race his own with nine wins. It’s around even-money that he’ll make it ten, with Dartmouth and Exosphere at the wicket. Dartmouth has been nudging and nurdling his way to his career-best figures, whereas Exosphere just slogged a six on his first ball back at Newmarket, in the Jockey Club Stakes. Each to his own, but I’ve always been more in the Pietersen camp; another bastion of Britishness.
Rule Britannia.
And to rule in the Britannia you have to back Out And About.
It’s one-in-a-blue-moon stuff, but every now and then a winning horse will even beat Twitterland when it comes to suggesting where it should go next. It can take the form of a gentle nod or a knowing wink, but sometimes it will just reach out and smack you in the face, as was the case with Out And About when he powered home at Haydock. Join that big dot to the next one, that his close relative Bilimbi was fourth in the 2014 Britannia, and you can start to see why Out And About is the handicap bet of the meeting.
I know that was then but it could be again.
It’ll be far more than 30 years of hurt before we see another of Frankel’s like, but the stunning start by his handful of offspring to have made the track so far has raised the eyebrow of even the most cynical commentators. Two of his winners are set to grace Royal Ascot on only their second start; Cunco in the Chesham and the Queen for a Queen, Mary for Kindly.
Frankel helped make Ascot what it is as much as the other way around, and the legacy is living on and running on, by winning on. Just imagine…
The perfect meeting needs the perfect venue, and Ascot fits the bill. It’s not fair to all, but that’s racing; it’s not to everyone’s taste, but that’s people; it’s not inclusive, but that’s Britain. Great Britain.
It’s coming home…
After all of this flag waving, I hope you know what to do to make money next week. Think St George. Order of St George. At least Ryan’s riding him.
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