The weather's been great and the crowds are up.
And there has been some wonderful racing as well so we would think this year's Royal Meeting will be remembered for all the right reasons.
So will we see a Royal winner? Saturday's action in the Group races gets underway with the Hardwicke Stakes G2 over 2400m with 9 runners. It's quite an interesting field with the St Leger winner Continuous heading the market on 7/4 for O'Brien-Moore. Middle Earth for the Gosdens with Oisin Murphy riding is on 2/1 and has solid claims based on his last win at Newbury where he beat Desert Hero. Desert Hero is of course the Royal runner who is trained by William Haggas with Tom Marqund riding and comes into this on 11/2. Ignore his last run at Newbury and his penultimate run was good. He won here last year so there are high hopes for a repetition this year. A really interesting "roughie" is Isle of Jura who had an excellent winter in Bahrain and has won here recently so he's going for a 5th consecutive winner and 12/1 looks value. We should also mention the American raider Missed the Cut 11/1 who won here two years ago but we don't think his recent form is as good.
The Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee is G1 over 1200m with 14 runners. Jane Chapple-Hyam's Mill Stream leads the market on 9/2 on the strength of a recent G2 win and solid form. William Buick is booked for the ride. Believing was fourth in the King Charles III on Tuesday and he wasn't very far behind the winner. He's on 6/1 for Boughey-Tudhope.
Mitbaahy and Shartash are on 11/2 in what is a very open race.
The Jersey Stakes is the last of the Group races and is a G3 over 1400m for the 3yos with 20 going to post. The 1-2 in the Irish 2000 Guineas clash again here and this time we think River Tiber could have the edge – he's 5/4 for O'Brien-Moore and is by Wooton Basset. Haatem is by Phoenix of Spain who was second in the Irish 2000 Guineas and third in the English version. Hannon-James Doyle and the quote is 11/4. We have a couple of roughies here – Boiling Point by Too Darn Hot is on 18/1 for Varian-Marquand.
He's been consistent and should be in the mix here. And Kikkuli is a half brother to Frankel through their Danehill daughter Kint dam. He's got potential just possibly needing time so will be interesting to see how he goes – on 20/1.
We don't normally look at the Heritage Handicaps but the Wokingham we cannot resist. It is a fabulous cavalry charge up the 1200. Straight with 28 runners involved, so a lucky pin is required. Wathnan Racing's Dark Trooper is on 6/1 for A de Mieulle and James Doyle. He's based in Doha but has won recently in France and will come out of gate 24.
If you ignore his last two races Albasher could be a lot shorter than 7/1 – Archie Watson and Hollie Doyle. And the lucky pin has landed on Mum's Tipple 14/1 who was fourth in this in 2023 and Ferrous 12/1 for Jack Channon and David Probert who has been very consistent so far this year.
