Think of Qatar Racing British Champions Day and your mind might spring back to Frankel’s QEII at the inaugural renewal or the brilliant colt getting down and dirty to win the following year’s Champion Stakes on his final racecourse appearance.
It might be Christophe Soumillon asking for donations after falling foul of the new whip rules and being hit with a meaty fine when lifting Cirrus Des Aigles home back in 2011.
Maybe it's Baaeed’s QEII success ten years later, Powerful Glory’s 200/1 Sprint shock last year or Frankie Dettori bringing the curtain down on his career on the perfect note aboard King Of Steel in the Champion Stakes, only to raise them again shortly afterwards for a worldwide farewell tour.
And the thing this year is there’s no obvious headline act, no single story that is going to make or break the afternoon. Constitution River back at a mile might have done – but he’s sticking at ten following a change of plan 48 hours after the Coolmore team stumped up £70,000 to put him in the QEII.
But fear not – they won’t be reaching for Soumillon’s hat and doing a whip-round.
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