Royal Ascot: day two: a royal winner?

The featured race at Royal Ascot today is the Prince of Wales´s Stakes over ten furlongs at 16.45 CET, a race which is often the best of the week. This is not the case today, but there is still the possibility of a rare highlight- a royal victory. The Queen is having a good season and Carlton House (Sir Michael Stoute/ Ryan Moore) could provide the high point by winning this prestigious event and give her the pleasure of receiving the trophy from the hands of her eldest son. Carlton House was a slight disappointment last season, a beaten favourite for both the Derby and Irish Derby, but made a satisfactory reappearance to win at Sandown and with the Stoute stable now in good form, can step up to win this Group One. The obvious danger is So You Think (Aidan and Joseph O´Brien), a beaten favourite for this last year but a 4-time Group One winner since arriving in Europe. He is possibly not quite as good as connections used to think, but is still a tough nut to crack and this di stance is ideal. Ex-French Planteur (Marco Botti/ Christophe Soumillon) and still-French Reliable Man (Alain de Royer-Dupre/ Gerald Mosse) have also not lived totally up to expectations, but are genuine Group One runners. More interesting is Godolphin´s Farhh, unbeaten in 3 minor events and now stepping up sharply in grade and in distance, but the son of German Group One winner Gonbarda could be anything. He needs to show massive improvement to win today, but that is by no means totally out of the question.