Royal Ascot Day 1 brings three Group 1 contests and four fiercely competitive handicaps across a seven race card featuring some of the best horses in training from Britain, Ireland, France and Australia. Every horse in these fields has earned the right to be here and finding winners at this meeting is never easy, but we have spent the week deep in the data, the form, the trends and the trainer signals to give you a pick in every race and a next best alongside it so you go into Tuesday armed with everything we’ve got.
The Lockinge form is the single strongest pointer to the Queen Anne and More Thunder ran a big race to finish second in that trial behind Notable Speech. His late closing profile is built for the stiff uphill finish at Ascot which rides more like a mile and a quarter than a flat mile, and that hill could compress the gap between him and the favourite. Tom Marquand takes the ride on a horse whose progressive record over further suggests the unique demands of this straight course will play to his strengths rather than expose any limitations.
RHR LONG SHOT: SIOUXPERB – 14/1
A field of 22 two year olds will sprint up the straight six furlongs in the opening juvenile contest of the week and this is a race where shocks happen regularly with two of the last five winners returning at massive prices. The market is dominated by two Aidan O’Brien colts but Royal Heritage is the horse that caught our eye after an effortless debut victory at Hamilton just six days before the meeting where he cruised clear under hands and heels without James Doyle ever having to ask a serious question. The 800,000 euro Breeze Up purchase is by Blue Point who was himself a dual Royal Ascot sprint champion and Doyle chose this colt over Wathnan’s other runner Ruler’s Pride which tells you everything about how this horse is regarded behind closed doors.
Siouxperb is a son of Sioux Nation who won his maiden at Yarmouth in emphatic style and his trainer Archie Watson said this week that he thinks quite a lot of him and that of all his Royal Ascot two year olds he would be the pick. That is significant because Watson is the man who trained Bradsell to win this very race before going on to land a Group 1 at this meeting and he also won the Windsor Castle with Soldier’s Call so he knows exactly what it takes to prepare a fast juvenile for the Ascot straight. The form of that Yarmouth debut is working out exceptionally well with the horses who finished behind him all winning their own maidens since and at a price in a 22 runner field where two of the last five winners returned at huge odds he represents exactly the kind of British trained outsider that can cause an upset.
RHR LONG SHOT: STARLUST – 33/1
Ryan Moore does not ride no hopers in Group 1 sprints and the decision to partner Mission Central in a field of 26 tells you exactly how highly Ballydoyle regard this horse heading into the biggest sprint of the season. By No Nay Never, the most prolific sire of winners at Royal Ascot in the last decade, Mission Central won his maiden at the Curragh by eight lengths under Moore before landing the Group 3 Round Tower Stakes and crucially he is a course winner at Ascot having won a conditions stakes at this track as a two year old. He also won the Sole Power Sprint Stakes this season to confirm he has trained on and with only one favourite winning this race since 2009 the market leader Overpass is immediately opposable at a short price in what is a cavalry charge up the straight.
Starlust won the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint and finished fourth in this very race last year before being given time off, and he returns in his final season before heading to stud in Australia with Rossa Ryan aboard at a price that underestimates a proven Group 1 sprinter who already knows the track.
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The race of the day and the pick we feel strongest about on the entire opening card. The withdrawal of French Guineas winner Rayif with a mild fever and the removal of O’Brien’s intended pacemakers Neolithic and Flushing Meadows reduces this to a six runner affair and fundamentally changes the shape of the race in favour of Gstaad. Without those pacemakers to inject early speed and set the contest up for Bow Echo’s devastating turn of foot this becomes a tactical affair where the horse who races prominently and controls the tempo holds all the cards. Gstaad is that horse. He won the Irish 2000 Guineas with tremendous authority having reversed the form from the 2,000 guineas at Newmarket, and the Irish Guineas is the single most important trial for this race with seven of the last twelve winners arriving via that exact route. The last four winners of the St James’s Palace were all Guineas winners and three of the four came through Ireland not England, which puts Gstaad on the right side of the strongest historical pipeline in the race. Ryan Moore takes the ride and he has won this three times before aboard Gleneagles, Circus Maximus and Paddington, each time for Aidan O’Brien who has won nine of the last twenty four runnings. Gstaad has never finished outside the first two in his career, he won the Coventry Stakes at this course twelve months ago by three lengths so the track holds no fears and by Starspangledbanner he is bred for speed and class in equal measure. Bow Echo is a brilliant horse and the best Guineas winner since Frankel according to some but at a shade of odds on he has not run for six weeks and the trends show ten of the last twelve winners had their most recent run within twenty six days. At 11/4 (at time of writing) Gstaad represents the kind of value that the data, the trends, the jockey booking and the tactical scenario all point towards. This is the bet of the day.
RHR LONG SHOT: TIM TOE – 25/1
Only two favourites have won the Ascot Stakes in the last twenty renewals which makes this a race to look beyond the market leader and Puturhandstogether arrives here with exactly the staying credentials this marathon distance demands having won the Irish Cesarewitch at the Curragh, one of the most prestigious staying handicaps in the calendar. He is trained by Joseph O’Brien who finished second in this race last year and is owned by JP McManus whose operation targets Royal Ascot every single year with surgical precision. Dylan Browne McMonagle takes the ride on a horse who has proven his stamina over extreme distances on both the flat and over hurdles and at a price in a maximum field of twenty the combination of a Cesarewitch winner, a trainer who knows this race and an owner who does not travel to Ascot without genuine belief makes him a serious player.
Tim Toe is an Irish trained stayer who announced himself when winning a bumper at Thurles over just short of two miles beating the well fancied Eagle Of Destiny and the Joseph O’Brien trained Galileo Sand who was sent off joint favourite that day. He is the kind of lightly raced and unexposed staying type that this race has consistently rewarded and at a big price in a maximum field he offers each way value as a horse whose stamina ceiling is still unknown.
RHR LONG SHOT: GAUCHER – 16/1
Nahraan finished a close second in this race twelve months ago and posted a career best Racing Post Rating when finishing fourth in a Saudi Arabian Group 2 over the same distance on good to firm ground in February. Four of the seven Wolferton winners since the race was upgraded to Listed status have been returned at double figure prices and the favourite has placed without winning in five of the last six runnings which makes this a race where proven course form at a price carries real weight. Nahraan already knows the track, has shown he handles fast ground and arrives here after a lengthy lay off, but its John Gosden and Oisin Murphy. The lay off means nothing at all.
Gaucher is by Frankel, widely regarded as the greatest racehorse of the modern era, and is trained by Willie Mullins whose Royal Ascot record in recent years has been remarkable having won the Ascot Stakes, the Copper Horse and the Queen Alexandra among others. When Mullins sends a horse across the Irish Sea for a Listed race at Royal Ascot it is never without purpose and a son of Frankel stepping onto the flat at this level for the most powerful jumps operation in training is exactly the kind of quietly plotted move that catches the market cold. At the price he represents a fascinating each way angle from a yard that does not travel without genuine belief.
RHR LONG SHOT: ASCENDING – 12/1
Gamrai arrives at the closing handicap over a mile and six furlongs in good form and the stamina demands of this trip on the round course at Ascot will suit a horse whose profile has been built around getting every yard of a staying distance. The Copper Horse was only introduced to the meeting in 2020 but has already established itself as a race that rewards lightly raced improvers and progressive types who are still ahead of the handicapper. In a maximum field of sixteen with three reserves this is a competitive handicap that requires both class and stamina in equal measure and at the price Gamrai represents the kind of value that makes the last race on the card worth waiting for.
Ascending won the Ascot Stakes at this meeting twelve months ago at a big price and what makes his appearance in the Copper Horse so interesting is that his trainer Henry De Bromhead said after that victory that the mile and six furlong race was always his preferred target but the horse didn’t get in so they ran in the two and a half mile contest instead and won it. He then went to York and finished second in the Sky Bet Ebor, one of the biggest staying handicaps in the calendar, over this exact trip which confirmed he has serious class at a mile and six furlongs on fast ground. Now he finally gets his chance in the race De Bromhead always wanted him in, at a track he has already won at, with Billy Lee back in the saddle and the good to firm ground that his form shows he thrives on. The Sporting Life jury flagged him specifically as a horse to follow back down in trip and in a race where course form and proven class carry real weight he looks a live each way contender.
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