JUNE 2022
We are all recovering from a very busy Royal Ascot and of course from all the 30th anniversary festivities at Broadspear on the Sunday before! What an amazing day we had - beautiful weather and our walled garden brimming with lovely share owners, delicious food, pink champagne galore and great music from Ronnie Scott’s jazz band! A chance to reflect on 30 wonderful years and to toast the next thirty!
Harry giving his 30th Anniversary speech
From there it was on to Ascot for Tuesday’s opening day and although Ascot this year wasn’t the same without Her Majesty The Queen it still produced the finest racing imaginable.
Our first runner was All The Time for the Royal Ascot Racing Club who ran in the Queen Mary on Wednesday. This lovely daughter of Kodiac had won on her debut by five lengths but disappointed badly to finish last. We later found out that she had tied up in the race - such a rarity and to do it on that stage was really bad luck! Thankfully she is fine and will reappear soon. Our other two year old Believing entered the stalls with her hood on and stood calmly until the wind blew her hood off! She then panicked and managed to get her leg over the side of the stalls which means immediate withdrawal. A complete and utter nightmare for everyone involved and another very unlucky incident. She too is fine and provided she passes her stalls test she will reappear in the Empress Stakes (Listed) at Newmarket on Saturday.
Harry on Sky Sports providing the commentary for the Royal Procession
Harrow and Atrium didn’t trouble the judge in the Brittania although Atrium ran pretty well but was too far back from the start. He is still one to watch though, especially with a bit of juice in the ground. Harrow didn’t exactly put his best foot forward and was gelded this week!
Paul Scope, Clodagh, Jill Buch in the pre parade ring
All eyes were on Cachet in the Coronation and our star Classic winning filly looked simply fabulous in the parade ring but sadly found that stiff Ascot mile too much to finish a tired 5th. She will now have a well earned break and then we will look to run her over an easy mile or even drop her back to seven furlongs. Last year’s champion two year old Inspiral was hugely impressive winning as she pleased and this very talented daughter of Frankel looks way the best three old filly in training in Europe over a mile.
Owners enjoying Clodagh's delicious buffet
Lysander ran an excellent race in the King Edward to finish third and as William Haggas said afterwards, he is very much “a work in progress” as he continues to strengthen and mature. He looked the likely winner turning for home but couldn’t peg back the Aidan O’Brien trained Changingoftheguard who had finished 5th in the Derby. There is much more to come with this fellow though and although he might well win a Pattern race this year it’s next season that will hopefully see him winning major group races.
Overview of the Pre Parade (Harry Centre) for Cachet running in the Coronation Stakes
We loved seeing so many of our owners from overseas including a fabulous team from Australia as well as from the US, Bermuda and Dubai. There was plenty of pre race banter at the picnics before racing in the Owners and Trainers car park as the Taittinger champagne flowed! We reckon that over the whole week we entertained over 500 very special owners.
All our owners enjoyed Taittinger Champagne!
Royal Ascot comes so early in the season and its easy to forget that there is still a long season ahead with so much to look forward to. This weekend we may have five runners with two in Pattern races so here’s to a thrilling and hopefully highly successful next stage of the season!
Mark Johnston relaxing with owners at the HTR BBQ
Harry Herbert, Chairman
Rolf's Ramblings
Rolf, Mark Johnston and Nicky Henderson at the Broadspear BBQ
Hip Hip, err not quite hooray for Frankie Dettori and Stradivarius in the Ascot Gold Cup - or for Ascot’s emblematic jockey on two of Her Majesty’s highest hopes at the Platinum Jubilee Royal meeting. Nor quite the ‘shout’ we had hoped for Highclere’s Royal Ascot contenders but whispers for the future nevertheless.
A less forgiving monarch – Henry VIII say - and Frankie could have found himself in the Tower. The defeated three times Gold Cup hero’s trainer John Gosden contented himself with the observation that his jockey “had over complicated matters”. Stradivarius headed for stud, led away hollering, advertising that he’s up for his new career.
Redemption for Dettori came in the Coronation Stakes on last year’s top juvenile filly Inspiral – at Cachet’s expense. In truth Cachet ran her heart out yet again and the official handicapper did not alter his opinion of her.She turned tables on the French filly who had beaten her in the Pouliches and finished further ahead of Prosperous Voyage than the magic day Cachet went into the history books for her One Thousand Guineas triumph.
Oaks winner Tuesday, third to Cachet in the Guineas, has been supplemented for the Irish Derby this weekend. This is form out of the top drawer. On the third day, Thursday, Highclere enjoyed a first, a second, a third and a fifth…and a withdrawn filly, Believing, who will shortly be seeking her own redemption. For those cheering home Rawyaan at Goodwood for his first, by no means last, Highclere victory it was a case of “Ascot, where’s t
Consider this though, Lysander, with his third placing in the King Edward VII Stakes emulated Title last year. The pair ahead of Lysander in the King Edward had run in the Derby which Lysander swerved – he’s still on his learning curve.
The official handicapper has done his best to make life difficult for Rawyaan shooting him up the weights: Tudor Queen’s second at Redcar showed Kevin Ryan’s perseverance with the four-time placed filly is on the verge of paying off.
Royal Ascot itself rose to the occasion of commemorating the Queen’s 70th anniversary on the throne. The crowds, over a quarter of a million of them, flocked back after three Covid-stricken years. The assembly paid respectful homage to their absent monarch and to the recent death of Lester Piggott whose long ‘shadow’ was the second biggest draw to Ascot for nearly half a century.The Queen’s first winner at ‘her’ meeting was Choir Boy in the 1953 Royal Hunt Cup: Lester’s first came the previous year on Malka’s Boy in the Wokingham: owner and jockey combined to win the Coronation Stakes in 1961 with Aiming High.
Joseph O’Brien became the first to win a Group One at the meeting as a jockey - So You Think in 2012 and as trainer, State of Rest, this year. Both victories came in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes. Yet Aidan O’Brien’s son has some way to go to match the peerless Piggott who is the only individual to ride, train, breed and own Royal meeting winners!
The signature performance of the week came in the very first race, the Queen Anne Stakes, as it had a decade ago when Frankel took everyone’s breath away careering away by eleven lengths.
Baaeed raised toppers too. Tracking Frankel’s footsteps, from the Lockinge, coincidentally (though it has to be said on different going) both horses took a sliver under ninety-eight seconds for Ascot’s mile.
Indelible memories tumbled over one another: star sprinter Native Trip escaping his Australian ‘winter’ and shrugging off Australian temperatures, and opposition, in the King’s Stand; Ryan More’s Gold Cup winning ride on Kyprios - Dettori’s frozen face in defeat. Then there was Moore’s rare grin (a collector’s item) returning to the scales on Rohaan after their Wokingham ‘steal’; the winning owner’s understandably over-excited post-race blurt – “This topped my wedding day and the birth of my children” was forgivable. Thankfully he avoided the ‘better than sex’ cliché.
Coroebus, franked his position as top three-year-old miler in a brutal St James’s Palace Stakes. Some reckon Godolphin’s colt could threaten Baaeed. Only Royal Patronage has so far ‘threatened’ Coroebus - when beating him in the Royal Lodge.
Perhaps the true glory of Royal Ascot is that its international flavour grows ever more piquant. The world’s major racing countries fielded runners. Native Trip might have been the exception this year as Japanese, American, French competitors found the going more difficult in a week of intense competition broadcast to 170 countries, twenty-one of which embraced betting into the Tote World Pool.
In this, the venture’s fourth year, Tote dividends, fertilized by punters worldwide, swamped bookmaker’s starting prices.
Turnover set new records, up over a third on last year at £168m; the largest amount on a single race, £6.6m, being bet on the Coronation Stakes.
If and when promise, potential is fulfilled, income from the Tote World Pool can be the universal salvation of the sport: three cheers.
On the track - June 22
By Frances Howard
Rawyaan won Impressively at Goodwood with Trevor Wheelan on Board
Since then however we have celebrated three…
Unfortunately we didn’t enjoy a great deal of success at the Royal meeting last week however both Cachet and Lysander ran with credit.
Since then however we have celebrated three winners from our last three runners. Firstly Rawyaan lifted our spirits after a mixed day at Ascot on Friday by winning the last at Goodwood comfortably. It was just his second run in the Highclere silks and for trainer George Baker. He has unfortunately been heavily penalised by the handicapper but he is now not far on a mark which could see him into some big prize handicaps, and hopes are high that this improving 3yo will provide his share owners with lots of fun through the season.
Parachute finally managed to put his best foot forward on Tuesday and show what he is capable of when cruising to an easy victory in the mile and a half handicap at Newbury. It was a great relief as this horse has bags of ability but his quirks have prevented him from showing it on the racecourse. Hopefully this success will give him the necessary confidence and he can progress from here.
The Ed Walker trained Parachute won at Newbury under a bold ride from William Buick
On Thursday, Revision - a 2yo son of Ardad took a step forward from his hugely promising debut and won the 6f novice at Newcastle in the style of a smart colt. Kevin Ryan has always held him in high regard and it was fantastic to see him prove it on the course. No plans have been made just yet as to where he will go next but I suspect Kevin will be looking at some grown up targets now which is very exciting.
Revision stormed up the home straight to win at Newcastle with Kevin Stott on Board after a very impressive debut at Haydock.
Looking ahead to the weekend, we are very excited to see what Believing can do in the Listed Empress stakes at Newmarket on Saturday. She was withdrawn in the Albany at Ascot having got very upset in the stalls which was obviously very disappointing but she has since passed a stalls test and hopefully she can right that wrong on Saturday.
Out and About with the Highclere Camera - June 2022
