Royal Ascot 2025: (Fillies' Group 2) Ribblesdale Stakes Stats Guide

Last year’s race
Winner: Port Fairy
Jockey: Ryan L Moore
Trainer: Aidan P O'Brien
Owner: M Tabor/D Smith/Mrs J Magnier/Westerberg
Age: 3
Weight: 9st 2lbs
Starting Price: 12/1
Season Form Figures: 12
Previous Best: 2nd - Weatherbys ePassport Cheshire Oaks (Fillies’ Listed), Chester (May 2024)

By Paul Jones

Oaks runners have a fair record in this Group 2 contest, given how few fillies have contested both prizes given the relatively-quickly turnaround, recording seven wins since 1997.

The Ribblesdale isn't a massively strong trends race but it can still pay to look to a later-developing improver, as just seven winners in the last 30 years had been contesting Group races as a juvenile, so it boasts a very similar pattern in this respect to the colts' equivalent of this race at the Royal meeting in the King Edward VII Stakes.

In victory last season, Port Fairy went one place better than in the Cheshire Oaks, so it can be argued that the last nine Ribblesdale winners (outside of the Covid year when the racing calendar was turned upside down) had first contested a recognised Oaks trial in Britain, Ireland or France on their previous run - if you want to stretch that to the Prix Saint-Alary. Of those nine, seven were beaten in their trial.

Sticking with the last run angle, five winners in the last 23 years were successful in a maiden last time out. The 2019 winner Star Catcher was previously third in the Listed fillies’ trial at Newbury but ended the season as the leading three-year-old middle-distance filly, adding three Group 1s after her success in the Ribblesdale.

The 2023 winner Warm Heart won the same Oaks trial before going on to win three Group 1 races following her Royal Ascot success, and she was only narrowly beaten at The Breeders’ Cup. Qilin Queen beat Revoir in this season’s running at Newbury before running in the Oaks.

Star Catcher was trained by John Gosden as was Loving Dream in 2021, who previously only finished fifth in the Lingfield Oaks Trial, though she also went on to register a Group 1 success later in the campaign and so was another for the stable to take a big step forward in winning here. The Gosden yard are chasing a fifth win in nine years (also saddled four seconds this century), having also won the Ribblesdale with Coronet and Frankly Darling.

Success for Port Fairy last year meant that Coolmore, now on five winners, joined Godolphin (all five for Saeed bin Suroor between 1998-2010, so none as yet for Charlie Appleby) and Juddmonte on the same figure. With regards to Juddmonte, their Bluestocking and Kalpana were only placed in the last two runnings, though that pair went on to win the Arc and be a leading hope for this year’s big race in Paris, so they clearly like to aim a very well-regarded, up-and-coming filly at this race.

Winning form earlier in the season is usually a good steer, with 20 of the last 26 winners having won either of their last two starts during that campaign, while 11 of the last 17 winners had won at either Group or Listed level at some point earlier in their career.

Following Port Fairy’s success for Aidan O’Brien last season, the Irish have now won the Ribblesdale 11 times in the last 23 years, so collectively they have fared considerably better than in the colt’s equivalent (King Edward VII).

At a glance summary

Positives
Contested a recognised Oaks trial
Won a Group or Listed race
Trained in Ireland or by John & Thady Gosden
Owned by Juddmonte
Last-time-out maiden winners
Did not contest a Group race as a two-year-old

Negatives
Not won either of last two starts