Wesley Ward was at Keeneland on Monday, his Ascot runners due to return on Wednesday, among them Campanelle, who was placed first Friday in the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup when Dragon Symbol was disqualified for compromising her chance to win outright.
Even considering that Caspar Fownes has been going well pretty much this entire Hong Kong racing season, the trainer’s performance June 20 at Sha Tin still stood out.
Eight Diamonds was rested after she finished 14th of 16 as a longshot in the Group 1 Surround Stakes at seven furlongs at Royal Randwick Racecourse in Sydney in February. Wednesday, Eight Diamonds starts in a more realistic race, a six-furlong handicap against males at Canterbury Park in Sydney.
Declan Schuster's Hong Kong Selections and Analysis for Wednesday, June 23, 2021 at Happy Valley.
Hong Kong Selections for Sunday, June 20, 2021 at Sha Tin.
The ‘Queen Alex’ remains the getting-out stakes ending the meeting and given its extreme distance for a flat race of 2m5½f, not all runners truly stay.
This is the second running of this handicap over 1m2f for three-year-olds rated 0-105 (though horses rated 106-107 are also eligible). The first running was won by the top weight, Highland Chief, who was drawn widest of all from stall 16 and went on to contest the Derby, beating the subsequent Adonis Hurdle winner, Tritonic, into second.
The quality of horse require to run in the Wokingham keeps is higher now than ever before so previous weight and official rating stats are rendered pretty much irrelevant as we are no longer dealing with like for like. Five winning favourites this century is a good return for such a competitive sprint handicap.
Previous Royal Ascot form has been a useful pointer as 12 of the last 25 winners had been placed at worst at this meeting before. In fact, both of last season’s 1-2 had placed at the meeting the previous year and the runner-up, Dream Of Dreams, is trying to make it third time lucky in this race having been touched off in photo finishes for the last two years. Whether it is the Berkshire course that brings the best out of such contenders or the fact that their connections have readied them for this particular week is a difficult one to weigh up but I would argue that there is something in both arguments.
When successful aged five in 2019, Defoe ended the long sequence of winning four-year-olds that has stretched out to 11 runnings. Jupiter Island is the only winner over the age of five since 1905.
