Rest of Royal Ascot: day two

The card begins with the Group Three Jersey Stakes for 3yo´s over 7 furlongs, which attracts mainly runners not regarded as good enough to run in yesterday´s St. James´s Palace. Free Judgement (Jim Bolger/ Kevin Manning), runner-up in the Irish 2,000 Guineas, and Shakespearean (Saeed bin Suroor/ Frankie Dettori), an easy all-the-way winner at Epsom, both have a 3lbs penalty but are still the class acts here.

Field of Dreams (Luca Cumani/ Jean-Pierre Guillambert) was a narrow winner at Newmarket from Red Jazz (Barry and Michael Hills), Rodrigo de Torrs (Henry Cecil/ Tom Queally) and Kaptain Kirkup (Michael Dods/ Phillip Makin), and there should be litle in it now, but Free Judgement, whose Irish form was given a boost when Canford Cliffs won yesterday, is the selection.

The Windsor Forest Stakes for 4yo and older fillies over a mile at 16.05 is a Group Two event and could see a German-bred winner, as Antara (Bin Suroor(/ Dettori) won well at Epsom last time and the opposition here does not look any stronger. Strawberrydaiquiri (Sir Michael Stoute/ Ryan Moore) has won 5 of her 7 starts, but needs to improve again, while Spacious (James Fanshawe/ Johnny Murtagh) won this last year. Sahpresa (Roderic Collet/ Olivier Peslier) has not run since finishing third in a valuable Japanese race last autumn; earlier she had taken a Group One at Newmarket bur she is now lumbered with a 7 lbs penalty, which makes things much tougher.
The Royal Hunt Cup at 17.25 is the big betting race of the day, but with 30 runners thundering down the straight mile, this is exceptionally difficult. Forgotten Voice (Jeremy Noseda/ Murtagh) won this in good style last year but now has top-weight, and we believe the winner will come from further down the handicap. According to the betting, Irish-trained Dandy Boy (David Marnane/ Colm O´Donoghue) and Acrostic (Cumani/ Fallon) are the favourites, but our four against the field are Riggins (Andrew Balding/ Jimmy Fortune), Mull of Killough (Jon Spearing/ Steve Drowne), Docofthebay (Jeremy Glover/ Robert Winston) and St. Moritz (Mark Johnston/ Joe Fanning).

The Queen Mary Stakes (2yo fillies, 5 furlongs, 18.00) has 18 runners, 13 of whom won last time out. This again is pure guesswork, but Irish hopes Meow (David Wachman/ Murtagh) and Moonlit Garden (Dermot Weld/ Pat Smullen) could get involved, as well as Richard Hannon´s pair Pennys Pearl (Dettori) and The Sydney Arms (Richard Hughes)