Qatar Racing set for huge Royal Ascot

Sky Lantern (left) defeats Just The Judge (right) in the QIPCO 1000 Guineas, but hopes are high at Qatar Racing that this form will be reversed at Royal Ascot. Image courtesy of racingfotos.com.

Just The Judge’s rematch with the filly who beat her in the QIPCO 1000 Guineas, Sky Lantern, promises to be one of the highlights of Royal Ascot.

That is set to take place in the Coronation Stakes, race three in the Fillies & Mares division of the QIPCO British Champions Series, two weeks from today.

David Redvers, racing manager to Sheikh Fahad who along with his two brothers owns Qatar Racing, a subsidiary of British Champions Series sponsor QIPCO Holding, told the Racing Post:

"Just The Judge will take all the beating in the Coronation.

"She’s come on a ton since they met and we wouldn’t be at all worried about taking her (Sky Lantern) on again.

"I saw her this morning and she looks magnificent. She’s unrecognisable from the filly who ran at Newmarket."

While they are targeting many horses at Royal Meeting’s two-year-old races, hoping to unearth stars for next year’s QIPCO British Champions Series, their other possible representatives in the Series races at Royal Ascot include Trade Storm in the Queen Anne Stakes, for which US raider Animal Kingdom is the hot favourite.

They could be double-handed in the King’s Stand Stakes with Spirit Quartz, who won a Group 2 in France last weekend, and the highly regarded Pearl Secret, while Side Glance could represent them in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes in which the brilliant Snow Fairy may make her comeback from injury.

Snow Fairy, trained by Ed Dunlop, had a workout at Sandown Park yesterday which prompted Dunlop to say: "At the moment Ascot is more likely than less likely."

The Prince of Wales’s is also likely to feature the one-two from the Tattersalls Gold Cup in Ireland two weeks ago, Al Kazeem and last year’s QIPCO 2000 Guineas and Investec Derby winner, Camelot.