Royal Ascot has increasingly become a magnet for international runners, this year attracting challengers from Australia, Hong Kong and the United States.
Wesley Ward has brought another strong team headed by the exciting American Rascal, whose mother Lady Aurelia won at the royal meeting twice. He contests the Norfolk Stakes.
Others have followed him with Christophe Clement, Tom Morley, Kenny McPeek and George Weaver having runners while Australian sprinters, and Wellington from Hong Kong, are leading contenders in both the King’s Stand Stakes and Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes.
They challenge on top of the usual mix of runners from Ireland, France and Germany as well as star Swedish sprinter Duca Di Como, if he gets into the field for the Wokingham Stakes.
COOLANGATTA (Australia) - King’s Stand Stakes (Tuesday)
From a purported string of 700 horses Ciaron Maher and Englishman David Eustace have picked this filly as their first Royal Ascot runner.
She will bid to become the seventh winner of the Group 1 Lightning Stakes to win the 5f sprint, of which Nature Strip last year was the latest.
“I suppose winning the Lightning Stakes down the straight at Flemington gives you some confidence about handling the track here,” says Maher. “Coolangatta is good fresh and, even after her win in the Lightning Stakes, I still feel she is a filly that is developing.”
CYNANE (USA) - Queen Mary Stakes (Wednesday)
British-born Tom Morley will saddle his first runner Cynane at the track where his late uncle David Morley won the 1997 Ascot Gold Cup with Celeric.
Cynane beat a Wesley Ward hotpot on debut at Belmont Park, New York, and will be ridden by Kentucky Derby-winning jockey Javier Castellano.
Morley says: “She won incredibly impressively, beating a three quarter of a million dollar horse of Wesley Ward’s, which I always think is a good benchmark.
“That filly could never get near my filly and within 100 yards the race was over.”
CLASSIC CAUSEWAY (USA) - Prince of Wales’s Stakes (Wednesday)
Trainer Kenny McPeek sent over Hard Buck to finish second in the 2004 King George, but has been dogged by bad luck since.
Rosalind lost her jockey exiting the stalls in the 2014 Coronation Stakes and Daddys Lil Darling was withdrawn from the 2017 Oaks after bolting.
Classic Causeway’s last win was a Group 1 victory over Charlie Appleby’s Nation’s Pride in July.
“We are still trying to get back to his Group 1 form.” says McPeek, “I anticipate he will be on the front as that’s his game. It’s his ideal distance.”
AMERICAN RASCAL (USA) - Norfolk Stakes (Thursday)
American Rascal will be Wesley Ward’s final runner at this year’s Royal Ascot and he hopes to have saved the best for last.
A son of Ward’s two-time Royal Ascot winner Lady Aurelia, he won on debut by 10½ lengths and will bid to become the trainer’s third winner of the Norfolk.
“He is really something,” says Ward. “He’s always been a high quality colt and came to the barn with great expectations
“He certainly stacks right up there with the two winners I have had of his particular race.”
ARTORIUS (Australia) - Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes (Saturday)
Artorius returns for a second crack at a race in which he finished an unlucky third a year ago.
His stable have been working on improving his speed out the stalls, which paid off when he got up to win a Group 1 by a short head in March.
“Hopefully he won’t be right out the back like he was last year,” says co-trainer Sam Freedman. “We’ve been working on him being three or four lengths closer for the past 12 months.
“He seems to be the best credentialled horse in the race.”
