There’s nothing more thrilling than the sight of a top-class thoroughbred sprinter in full flight.
The Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes is a fitting and new name for Saturday’s feature which over the years has allowed some of the biggest names in the world to dazzle down the Ascot straight six furlongs.
Choisir and Black Caviar travelled from the other side of the world to underline the fact they breed and train them fast in Australia and this year Artorious, Cannonball and The Astrologist bid to follow in their sacred hoofprints.
It’s the former who all eyes are on. Coolangatta and Cannonball himself failed to fly the Australian Blue Ensign with particular distinction in the King’s Stand but throughout the build-up we’ve been told the Saturday sprinter is the one.
He was third in both this race and the July Cup last season and returned home to snare a Canterbury Stakes at Randwick before boarding the plane again.
Perhaps the experience he gained last summer will be the difference this time, the marginal gains we all seek.
Or perhaps Hong Kong flier Wellington will have his day in the Ascot sun. He won five times at Sha Tin last season including the Longines Hong Kong Sprint in December.
He hasn’t quite been at that level this term – but close enough to it to suggest he could make them all go.
There’s the aptly-named Big Invasion who went six in a row in his homeland, the US of A last year and was back on track when second of 14 to Caravel in the Grade One Jaipur Stakes at Belmont a fortnight ago.
We’ve a rare French raider at this year’s Royal Ascot in the Prix de l’Abbaye third Coeur Du Pierre and then there’s the home defence.
It’s led by the remarkable Highfield Princess, herself a high-profile five-time winner in 2022 and touched off by the drifting Bradsell in Tuesday’s King Stand. Maybe she’d never have got past anyway, but Jason Hart cut an animated and frustrated figure in the stewards’ enquiry afterwards. He might only have to wait four days for swift compensation.
She’s the sort of rags-to-riches story that has been behind some of the great overseas sprinters of the recent past. Progressing through low-grade handicaps to the top of the sprinting tree for open and likeable connections.
This will likely be her final season on the track and the team has mapped out an ambitious programme that takes in just about every major dance at home and abroad.
She’ll see some of these again on that road. But if she sees them off on her own turf first, it might set up a farewell tour that rivals Frankie’s. Well, almost.
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