2 days ago
4
Greg Wood
3.05 HARDWICKE STAKES preview
This is officially a Group Two event but it is a Group One in all but name, with no fewer than five previous winners at the highest level among the dozen runners. That list includes Goliath, the King George winner over this track and trip in 2024; Ethical Diamond, the surprise winner of the Breeders’ Cup Turf for Willie Mullins at Del Mar last November; and Jan Brueghel, a Classic winner in the St Leger in 2024 and also the winner of last season’s Coronation Cup at Epsom. The market is headed, though, by Andrew Balding’s Kalpana, a dual winner of the Group One race for fillies’ and mares over this trip on Champions Day in October and also the runner-up behind Calandagan – the top-rated horse on the planet last year – in the 2025 King George. She looked as good as ever, if not perhaps even better for another winter, when successful in the Aston Park Stakes at Newbury in May and will take all the beating.
Timeform top-rated: Kalpana
SELECTION: KALPANA
Greg Wood
2.30 NORFOLK STAKES preview
A big chance for Aidan O’Brien to get one-and-a-half hands on the trainers’ trophy as Carry The Flag heads the field for this juvenile five-furlong sprint. The record-breaking trainer has not dominated this race in the past in quite the manner of some events on the schedule, but Carry The Flag’s form behind his stable companion Great Barrier Reef looks rock-solid after the latter colt’s victory in the Coventry Stakes here on Tuesday. Joseph O’Brien too has a single runner in Star Prospect, who had Carry The Flag back in second at the Curragh in April when both colts were making their racecourse debuts. Home-trained contenders prominent in the betting include Orthodox, Flight Signal and Where Love Lives, all unbeaten, and Kevin Phillipart de Foy’s Force Noir, a recent transfer from Amo Racing’s main Irish stable, while the American raider Wesley Ward fields three as he attempts to follow up Friday evening’s somewhat controversial success with Bacio.
Timeform top-rated: Carry The Flag.
SELECTION: FORCE NOIR
I’m going to start launching previews of the day’s action from our racing correspondent and tipster Greg Wood, who is currently leading the national press challenge in the Racing Post.
Morning. After a day at the track yesterday (which was marvellous I have to say) I’m back chained to the desk but raring to go.
Let’s get started with the weather and non-runner news …
The going for day five of Royal Ascot, Saturday 20th June, is: Good to Firm.
There has been an awful lot of talk about the draw bias down the straight track this week (with the stands side and those drawn high very much the preference)
Here are the GoingStick readings at 8.30am for what its worth:
Stands’ side: 9.0
Centre: 8.9
Far side: 8.9
Round: 7.7
Non-runners today
5.00pm Wokingham Stakes Handicap
13 Caburn (self certficate – going)
5.35pm Golden Gates Stakes (Handicap)
5 Accredit (self certificate – temperature)
Greg Wood
Hello from Ascot on the final morning of the 2026 Royal meeting, ahead of a day that will decide the trainers’ and jockeys’ titles across the meeting’s 35 races, and when we will also discover whether or not Ryan Moore will need to wait another year to join his major employer, Aidan O’Brien, with a century of winners at the meeting.
Moore, who is now on 98 Royal winners in all after a double on Friday, is pretty much home for all money in the jockeys’ race with six wins over the first four days, meaning that Billy Loughnane would need a four-timer at least from his six rides on the final day card to overhaul him.
The trainers’ title, though, remains a fascinating family affair between Aidan O’Brien, currently on six winners, and his oldest son, Joseph, who has saddled five thus far. Both have runners in the same five races today – missing out on the 3.40 and 5.00 – with O’Brien snr due to saddle eight in all and Joseph fielding seven.
The feature race of the afternoon, meanwhile, is the Group One Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at 3.40, where two big names from overseas – the Australian-trained Joliestar and Japan’s Satono Reve, last year’s runner-up – head the market.
The big field of Group One sprinters will fairly fly down the straight six furlongs, but a major point of interest will be whether those towards the stands’ rail continue to fly just that little bit faster, as has been the case in races on the straight course all week. There is a difference of just 0.1 in the GoingStick readings on the near and far sides this morning, a significantly smaller gap than yesterday’s, but whether that will be enough to stop jockeys in low-numbered stalls veering left after the start remains to be seen.
The going at Ascot remains good-to-firm after 5mm of watering overnight, picks for the final seven races of Flat racing’s showpiece event are here, and the action is underway with the Norfolk Stakes – where Aidan O’Brien fields the likely favourite, Carry The Flag, at 2.30.
English (US) ·