Even when he wins in exceptional fashion, as he did in the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on Saturday at Ascot, Excelebration can’t escape Frankel’s shadow.

A half-hour after Excelebration effortlessly handled the good miler Cityscape, tallying a three-length score, Frankel ended his perfect career with a rousing win in the Champion Stakes. Five of Excelebration’s six losses over three racing seasons have come in races won by Frankel, and on four of those occasions, Excelebration finished second to him.

Frankel completed a brilliant undefeated career winning for the 14th time in the Champion Stakes on Saturday at Ascot in England, staking his claim as one of the best racehorses ever with a 1 3/4-length victory over the top-class French invader Cirrus des Aigles.

In Europe, Dunaden is just another solid upper-tier racehorse, but take him to Australia and Dunaden shines. The 2011 Melbourne Cup winner returned from a summer in the Northern Hemisphere and impressively captured the Group 1 Caulfield Cup on Saturday in Australia, rallying from 16^th to beat Alcopop by a half-length.

More rain fell at already sodden Ascot Racecourse on Friday afternoon, prompting the first statements of concern from the connections of Frankel, the undefeated superstar who is entered to race Saturday in the Champion Stakes.

Frankel starts in the Champion Stakes on Saturday at England, but the imprint of his career presses hard into the second-best race on Ascot’s card, the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

Anyone with even half an ear to the international racing scene might be experiencing cognitive dissonance late this week.

On the one hand, racing luminaries have lined up to sing the praises of the mighty Frankel, who will try to win his 14th race without a loss in the Group 1 Champion Stakes on Saturday at Ascot. Everyone is calling him the best in the world. Trainer Andre Fabre called Frankel the best he’s ever seen. Star jockey William Buick rides Nathaniel, the third choice in the Champion, and even he was quoted as saying Frankel “looks unbeatable.”

For months the plan has been to send the great Frankel to the breeding shed after his swan song in the Champion Stakes on Saturday at Ascot. Mother Nature, however, has no intention of seeing Frankel ride off into the sunset.

Americain and Dunaden, two past winners of the Melbourne Cup, are part of the field for Saturday’s Group 1 Caulfield Cup in Caulfield, Australia, but are considered outsiders in an 18-horse field led by the English import Glencadam Gold.

Trained by Gai Waterhouse, Glencadam Gold won his Australian debut in the Group 1 Metropolitan Handicap over 1 1/2 miles on Oct. 6. In his last start in England, Glencadam Gold, a 4-year-old Irish-bred gelding by Refuse to Bend, won the Group 3 Newcastle Gold Cup in September.

Gentildonna became the fourth filly to capture the Japanese Triple Crown for fillies with her nose victory over Verxina in Sunday’s $2.3 million Shuka Sho at Kyoto Racecourse.

Ridden by Yasunari Iwata for trainer Sei Ishizaka, Gentildonna, the 3-10 favorite, closed from the middle of the field of 18 3-year-old fillies to catch Verxina in the final sixteenth. Aromatico finished third.

The first two finishers are by Deep Impact. Gentildonna became the first filly to win the Japanese Triple Crown since Apapane in 2010.

Undefeated favorites won both Group 1 races for 2-year-olds Saturday at Newmarket in England, but Reckless Abandon’s victory in the Middle Park Stakes required far more grit than it took for Dawn Approach to win the Dewhurst Stakes.

Well backed Moohaajim appeared to be slightly in front of Reckless Abandon perhaps 50 yards before the finish of the six-furlong race, and he was clearly in front again not far past the finishing post, but at the wire it was Reckless Abandon by a neck, winning for the fifth time without a defeat.