Last year’s race: Winner: Charyn Jockey: Silvestre De Sousa Trainer: Roger Varian Owner: Nurlan Bizakov Age: 4 Weight: 9st 2lbs Starting Price: 100/30 Season Form Figures: 112 Previous Best: 2nd - Lockinge Stakes (Group 1), Newbury (May 2024) By Paul Jones In the Queen Anne we have the strongest trends race of the 35 to take place at Royal Ascot to kick off the five-day extravaganza. Sixteen of the last 22 winners had already struck at Group 1 level and it is the Lockinge Stakes that has been the key guide having featured 25 Queen Anne winners since 1980 including Palace Pier and Baaeed who completed the double in two of the last four seasons. Being the first domestic Group 1 of the season for older horses that takes place over a mile, the Lockinge is the natural starting point. However, defeated horses at Newbury actually have a better winning record than the winner (Charyn being the latest last year) claiming 16 of the last 29 runnings but of course there are more beaten horses than winners so plenty will be siding with Classic winners Rosallion (3rd) and Notable Speech (4th) who were both using Newbury as a tee-up for Royal Ascot to overturn placings with Lead Artist (1st) and Dancing Gemini (2nd). Of that quartet, Dancing Gemini was the only horse with the advantage of full race fitness having already won twice this turf season, although Lead Artist also had a run behind him at Sandown. Another Classic winner, Fallen Angel (6th), is also expected to improve fitness-wise for her seasonal debut in the Lockinge where low-drawn horses fought out the finish so maybe the draw was also at play? Godolphin have won eight Queen Anne’s down the years and their 2000 Guineas winner last season who added the Sussex Stakes, Notable Speech, shaped like the race would do him plenty of good in the Lockinge. The same can be argued for Rosallion, who was runner-up to Notable Speech at Newmarket before winning the Irish 2000 Guineas and St James’s Palace Stakes, only for illness to rule him out of the rest of last season. The Hannon stable took this in 2009 and 2011 with Paco Boy and Canford Cliffs who prepped in the Lockinge and they were on the board again with Toronado in 2014. The Lockinge also-rans, Fallen Angel and Tamfana, have chances if re-finding their best form but their leading hope for fillies/mares appears to be Porta Fortuna who reeled off three Group 1 wins against her own sex last season after finishing second in the 1000 Guineas and she made a winning return at The Curragh at Group 2 level under a penalty when considered to be short of fitness. However, the only two fillies/mares to win in the Queen Anne in the last 50 years were reigning Breeders’ Cup Mile winners, Goldikova and Tepin. Four-year-olds dominate the head of the Queen Anne market so it’s long odds-on that they will extend their winning record to 25 of the last 32 runnings. In 2019, Lord Glitters at the age of six became the oldest winner since 1976 and the French-trained Facteur Cheval, who was well fancied last year but could only finish sixth when racing away from the main pack, could bid to emulate him, though he is not entering the summer in quite the same form as last year. The French have won on three occasions going back to 2005. In very recent seasons the Paradise Stakes has been marketed as a Queen Anne trial despite its Listed status, but results show that this is now justified. For example, the winner in 2020 went on to be a big-priced third in the Queen Anne and the 2019 third, Accidental Agent, even went on to cause a 33/1 surprise in the Queen Anne after finishing sixth in the Lockinge in between. The Paradise Stakes winner that year, Century Dream, also ran very well in the Queen Anne only beaten ¾l into fourth and the 2022 third, Sir Busker, filled the same position in the Group 1 at the Royal Meeting. Docklands then finished runner-up in both races last season and he looks set to return to the Queen Anne after he shaped well when second to Sardinian Warrior in this year’s running with the subsequent Lockinge fifth, Checkandchallenge, back in third. Ignoring the Covid year when Royal Ascot began just two weeks into the belated start to the season, only one seasonal debutant prior to Triple Time in 2023, who caused a 33/1 surprise, Toronado, has won since Allied Forces in 1997, which would be against Aidan O’Brien’s shortest-priced contender, Diego Velasquez. The Ballydoyle operation has had mixed fortunes in the Queen Anne for Coolmore as horses with more brilliance than his four winners (Ad Valorem, Haradasun, Declaration Of War and Circus Maximus) such as Hawk Wing, George Washington and Rip Van Winkle all even failed to place. At a glance summary Positives: Contested the Lockinge Stakes Four-year-olds Owned by Godolphin Trained by Richard Hannon Negatives: Failed to win a Group 1 Aged over five Fillies/mares (unless a Breeders’ Cup winner) Seasonal debutantes