In 2010, Snow Fairy won four Group 1 races in four countries on two continents. How much she can accomplish this year will be better known on Saturday when Snow Fairy makes her 4-year-old debut in the Group 1 Pretty Polly Stakes for fillies and mares at the Curragh in Ireland.
Run over 1 1/4 miles, the Pretty Polly Stakes is part of the Breeders’ Cup Challenge program, offering an automatic berth for the winner to the BC Filly and Mare Turf at Churchill Downs in November.
Society’s Rock, second in the race last year, scored an upset in the Group 1 Golden Jubilee on Saturday, the final day of the 2011 Royal Ascot meeting, but it was Group 2 Hardwicke Stakes winner Await the Dawn whom American racing fans may want to follow.
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The French invader Immortal Verse rallied from last in a field of 12 to win the first Group 1 race of her career in Friday’s Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot, the meeting’s premier race for 3-year-old fillies.
Delegator is the best-known horse and possible favorite for the Group 1 Golden Jubilee on Saturday at Royal Ascot, but his credentials for the five-furlong dash hardly are impeccable. Delegator has been a miler for most of his career, and the change in course conditions late this week, from good-firm to good-soft, might not be to his advantage, either.
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The question was whether Fame and Glory, the most talented horse in the Ascot Gold Cup, could stay the race’s demanding 2 1/2-mile distance. The answer was a resounding yes, as Fame and Glory captured the Group 1 Gold Cup by three lengths under Jamie Spencer. Opinion Poll finished second, Brigantin third, and Manighar fourth.
Trainer Richard Hannon sent out Strong Suit to win the Group 3 Jersey Stakes for 3-year-olds at seven furlongs in the first race at Royal Ascot on Wednesday, but there was bigger news from the Hannon camp, with a trip to the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Churchill now considered a strong option for Canford Cliffs, who won the Group 1 Queen Anne Stakes on Tuesday and ranks as Europe’s top miler.
More Than Real, the winner of the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Churchill Downs last fall, faces a formidable task when she makes her 2011 debut in Friday’s Group 1 Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot in England.
The premier race of the Royal Ascot meeting for 3-year-old fillies will also be More Than Real’s first start outside of North America.
Because of its 1 1/2-mile distance, unusually long by American dirt-racing standards, some refer to the Belmont Stakes, run last Saturday, as the Test of the Champion. Compared with the Ascot Gold Cup, the Belmont is mere child’s play.
One and one-half miles into the Group 1 Gold Cup, the runners at Royal Ascot on Thursday still will have a full mile left on their journey. Deep lungs and powerful heart will be prized over fleet feet, and favored Fame and Glory still has to prove he can see out the 20-furlong Gold Cup.
The style of racing was different, but the result was unchanged – Frankel stretched his unbeaten streak to seven races after a thrilling win in Tuesday’s Group 1 St. James’s Palace Stakes at Royal Ascot.
Unlike his six-length win in the English 2000 Guineas in late April, when he led throughout, Frankel stalked pacesetter Rerouted for the first half-mile of the St. James’s Palace Stakes, took a comfortable lead with a quarter-mile remaining, but was fully extended to win the one-mile race for 3-year-olds.
