Golden Jubilee Stakes Betting

The final day of the Royal Ascot meeting in June provides a dramatic climax to five days of racing, pageantry and fashion. The highlight of this day is the Golden Jubilee Stakes, which is the second British leg of the Global Sprint Challenge, preceded by the King’s Stand Stakes held on opening day and followed by the July Cup.

Open to Thoroughbreds aged three years and upwards, the Golden Jubilee Stakes is a Group 1 flat horse race that covers a distance of six furlongs on the straight turf the famed Ascot Racecourse mile. The three-year-old sprinters carry eight stone eleven pounds, while the older horses bear nine-stone-four, with allowances of three pounds for fillies and mares. There are no penalty weights for previous winners.

Saturday racing is a relatively new addition to the Royal Ascot schedule, introduced as recently as 2002. This event, however, has a proud history dating back to 1868. It was inaugurated as the “All-Aged Stakes,” a title that was changed in 1926 to the “Cork and Orrery Stakes.” The new name honoured the 9th Earl of Cork, who during the 19th century had served as the Master of the Buckhounds at Ascot.

In 1971, the race was classified as a Group 3 sprint. It gained promotion to Group 2 in 1998 and then achieved Group 1 status in 2002, when it was moved to Day Five and renamed to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. With a prize purse of £450,000, it is now one of the two most valuable events of the five-day meeting along with the Prince of Wales’s Stakes as well as being one of the world’s most prestigious contests for sprinters.

To find the most successful horse in this event, one must look back to 1872~74, when Prince Charlie sped to a hat-trick of victories. Since then, only two have raced to double wins: Hornet’s Beauty in 1913-14 and Right Boy in 1958-59. More recently, the Australian Thoroughbred Cloisir has given fans reason to cheer, winning the both the King’s Stand Stakes and this race in a single week in 2003.

The top jockey of the Golden Jubilee Stakes over the years stands head and shoulders above the rest. Lester Piggott won this race a commanding nine times between his back-to-back triumphs on Right Boy and his final win on College Chapel in 1993. He was the rider on Tin Whistle in 1960, El Gallo in 1963, Mountain Call in 1968, Welsh Saint in 1970, Saritamer in 1974 and Thatching in 1979.

Among trainers, Vincent O’Brien had the most success at the Golden Jubilee Stakes. His five winners included Piggott’s rides Welsh Saint, Saritamer, Thatching and College Chapel as well as Swingtime in 1975. Since 1993, no trainer has brought more than a single winner to the event.

Punters acknowledge that the Golden Jubilee Stakes is a difficult race to call. It typically features a large field—a full two dozen started in 2010—and the action is frenetic over such a short distance. Certain starting positions may produce more winners than others. Four-year-olds tend to set the pace, although two three-years and a brace of six-year-olds have win here during the last five outings, and seven-year-old Cape of Good Hope was victorious in 2005, when the race took place in York.

One jockey to follow is Johnny Murtagh, who has mounted four winners since the turn of the new millennium. His latest triumph was on board four-year-old Starspangledbanner in 2010, an Australian-bred colt trained by Aiden O’Brien and running as the joint-favourite at 13/2 odds.

Those seeking ante post betting opportunities for the Golden Jubilee Stakes can find them at Stan James, ladbrokes, bet365 and william hill as early as two months prior to post time. The betting exchange known as betfair offers early odds, too—quite often at higher prices.

Go To bet365

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