Key events
At the end of a long season and often run on testing ground this is not normally a meeting for backing short-priced favourites but punters are getting stuck in. Oddschecker inform me that these are the three best-backed horses so far:
Kyprios 4/5 (1.20pm)
Charyn 7/4 (3.15pm)
Calandagan 6/4 (3.35pm)
The treble, they tell me, pays 11-1.
It’s not the end of the Flat turf season yet but the champions will be crowned today, including the top jockey Oisin Murphy.
It’s #ChampionsDay!
Picking up the Jockeys’ Championship trophy will be culmination of hours on the road, dedication to my weight and focus on riding winners every day. But I couldn’t do it without all the support. Thank you and I’ll be very happy to lift the trophy at 2.50pm. pic.twitter.com/9Tb18gpEIG— Oisín Murphy (@oismurphy) October 19, 2024
One of the hot favourites on the day has arrived
It’s squidgy ground (that’s officially soft!) and will be tough going but at least the rain has stopped falling now.
Good afternoon. These are the races to look forward to on a cracking card at Ascot.
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1.20pm: QIPCO British Champions Long Distance Cup, Group 2
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1.55pm: QIPCO British Champions Sprint Stakes, Group 1
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2.35pm: QIPCO British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes, Group 1
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3.15pm: Queen Elizabeth II Stakes (sponsored by QIPCO), Group 1
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3.55pm: QIPCO Champion Stakes, Group 1
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4.35pm: Balmoral Handicap (sponsored by QIPCO)
Preamble
Greg Wood
Good afternoon from Ascot, where the rain that has been falling fairly persistently for much of the last 12 hours is – hopefully – starting to ease ahead of Britain’s most valuable afternoon at the races: Qipco Champions Day, with £4.1m and four Group One races up for grabs.
The track updated its expectations to a 29,000 crowd on Friday evening, not far short of the attendance to see Frankie Dettori draw the curtain on his British career 12 months ago. A wet start to the day was the last thing anyone wanted, as it may well put at least a slight dent in the “walk-up” ticket sales, but anyone within easy reach of the track who is at a loose end should be aware that there are even occasional patches of blue sky appearing over Berkshire at present.
As was the case last year, the action in the three events on the round course will unfold on the tight inner track due to concerns over the going. It’s not a great look for a day designed to celebrate the summer code that it has ended up on Ascot’s hurdles track for three of the last six years, but it didn’t seem to bother anyone too much 12 months ago and the field sizes are unusually strong, so hopefully not many spectators will notice that the runners are a little further away than ideal.
The Champion Stakes, with £1.3m in the pot, is the feature at 3.55, and the overnight rain seems to be behind a distinct move in favour of Francis-Henri Graffard’s Calandagan, who has form on soft ground and also stays 12 furlongs, in the betting this morning. The King Edward VII Stakes winner is now top-priced at around 13-8, with his fellow three-year-old, Economics, the Irish Champion Stakes winner, as big as 9-4.
Charyn, another winner at the Royal meeting in June, also heads the market at around 13-8 in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on the straight mile at 3.15, while the emerging talent Kalpana is the likely favourite for the Fillies’ & Mares’ and it is anyone’s guess which of the runners will set off as the punters’ pick for the 16-strong Sprint.
You can follow all the action as it happens here on our live blog from the first race to the last (the only handicap on the card, at 4.35) and we are underway on the track at 1.20, when the dual Gold Cup winner, Kyprios, will attempt to get favourite-backers off and running at odds-on in the Long Distance Cup.
