Champions Day Preview: The Last Word on the Flat
Champions Day at Ascot on Saturday is where the Flat season ends, and it ends properly. Five Group 1s, a two-year-old race worth a fortune, a big-field handicap to close the show, and more prize money than any other day in British racing. It’s mid-October, the evenings are drawing in, and the horses that lit up the summer come back for one last argument. Declarations aren’t out yet, so this isn’t about who runs. It’s about what each race means, who has won them before, and the stars lining up to write the next chapter. It starts with the youngest race on the card. The Two-Year-Old Conditions Stakes was run for the first time only last year, and Aidan O’Brien won it with Mission Central at 5/1. Six furlongs, a big field of juveniles, and a first proper look at horses who could be talking points by the Guineas next spring. It has no history yet. Give it time. The Long Distance Cup is the opposite. This is the stayers’ championship, two miles at the end of a season spent at the Gold Cup, Goodwood and York, and its roots run deep. When it was the Jockey Club Cup at Newmarket, Further Flight won it five years running from 1991, and Persian Punch, the people’s stayer, won it three times. Since the move to Ascot it has belonged to the best stayers of their time. Stradivarius won it in 2018. Trueshan won it three years in a row. Kyprios took it in 2024, and Trawlerman has won it twice, including last year. It became a Group 1 only last year, so the prize has never been bigger. Watch for Gregory. He won by 11 lengths at Newmarket last month for the Gosdens, and he’s aimed straight here. Then the pace changes completely. The Champions Sprint was the Diadem Stakes until 2011, and it’s been a Group 1 since 2015, when Muhaarar won the first one. It refuses to follow the script. Last year Powerful Glory won it at 200/1, the biggest-priced Group 1 winner in history. This year it has a proper headliner. Almeraq destroyed his field in the Sprint Cup at Haydock by more than four lengths, and William Haggas has pointed him straight at Ascot. Kind Of Blue, who won this two years ago, is among the entries too. The Fillies and Mares Stakes could be the race of the day, and that’s down to one mare. Kalpana won it in 2024. She won it again last year at 11/8. On Saturday she goes for three, which no horse has ever done. She’s arguably better than ever this year: in July she beat Calandagan in the King George, getting her revenge for the year before. Dancing Rain won the first running at Ascot in 2011, and the great Magical won it in 2018. Kalpana could put her name above them all. The Queen Elizabeth II Stakes is the championship mile, and it has the deepest history on the card. Brigadier Gerard won it twice. Kris won it. Dubai Millennium won it. Frankel won it in 2011, and Baaeed and Big Rock have added their names since. But this race loves to tear up the script. Last year Field Of Gold went off the 13/8 favourite and finished fifth, and Cicero’s Gift won it at 100/1 for Charles Hills and Jason Watson. A mile on the straight course leaves nowhere to hide, and the result doesn’t always go with the reputations. Then comes the race the whole day is built around. The Champion Stakes was run at Newmarket from 1877 until it moved to Ascot in 2011, and it’s still the richest race of the afternoon. Frankel finished his unbeaten career here in 2012, beating Cirrus des Aigles, who had won it the year before. Cracksman won it twice. Magical won it. Last year Calandagan beat Ombudsman, 15/8 against the 13/8 favourite, and the rematch is on. Ombudsman has won the Prince of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot two years running, and a dry week only helps him. Bay City Roller comes in having just finished second in the Arc. A mile and a quarter at Ascot in October, and the last word on who the best middle-distance horse in Britain is. The day closes with the Balmoral Handicap, a mile on the straight course with up to twenty runners and serious money on offer. It’s a race that pays the brave. Shelir won it at 80/1 in 2022 for David O’Meara, who has won it three times, and The Gatekeeper took it at 25/1 the year after. Lord Glitters won it in 2017 and went on to win the Queen Anne at Royal Ascot. Crown Of Oaks won it last year at 5/1 and could be back. There’s one more crown handed out on Saturday, and it isn’t for a horse. Billy Loughnane is going to be champion jockey for the first time. He goes into the final week 29 winners clear of Oisin Murphy, a five-time champion who has won the last two. Loughnane is only 20. In 2025 he rode 222 winners in a calendar year, a record for this century. This May he won his first British Classic on Bow Echo in the 2000 Guineas, then won the St James’s Palace Stakes at Royal Ascot on the same horse. On Saturday he gets the trophy at Ascot in front of the biggest crowd of the autumn. If this season is anything to go by, it’s the first of many. Our angles come on Friday. Once the fields are known, we’ll run every race on Saturday’s card through the numbers and tell you which horses our angles have picked out, race by race. www.rompinghomeracing.com HORSE RACING FILTERED by RHR angles. Horse racing involves risk. Bet responsibly – only bet what you can afford to lose. RHR selections are for informational and entertainment purposes only. Prices correct at time of publishing, always check with your bookmaker