Royal Ascot
A queen out riding spotted a stretch of heath in 1711 and said it would do nicely for racing. More than 300 years later, the hats are still the second-most-talked-about thing.
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Quick Facts
- Founded
- 1711, by Queen Anne
- Location
- Ascot, Berkshire, about six miles from Windsor Castle
- When
- Five days, Tuesday to Saturday, every June
- Headline race
- The Gold Cup on Thursday, first run in 1807
- Royal Procession
- Carriages have driven down the straight mile since 1825
- Royal Enclosure
- Reserved for George III's family and guests in 1807; George IV added a two-storey stand and lawn in 1822
- Famous exile
- The 2005 meeting was held at York while Ascot was rebuilt
- Attendance
- Roughly 300,000 people over the week
The queen who found a racecourse by accident
Royal Ascot begins with a ride in the country. Queen Anne, out near Windsor, came across an open stretch of heath that struck her as ideal for horses to gallop flat out. In 1711 she had it set up for racing, and the first contest, Her Majesty's Plate, was run on 11 August that year for 100 guineas. The course has been in royal hands ever since. It is owned by the Crown Estate, and the monarch's connection is the thread running through every tradition that followed. The layout is still a right-handed circuit with a famous straight mile, and the finish is on a rise that tests tired horses.
Why the carriages come down the straight
The meeting's defining image is the Royal Procession. Since 1825, the monarch and guests have arrived by horse-drawn carriage, travelling from Windsor and rolling down the straight mile in front of the crowd before the first race. It is the one moment when the racing waits for the pageantry. The Royal Enclosure began in 1807, when an area was reserved for George III's family, guests and household. In 1822 George IV commissioned a two-storey stand with a lawn around it, and entry was by royal invitation. The enclosure guarded its rules fiercely. Divorced people were barred from it until 1955, which sounds extraordinary now, and the dress code still turns heads. Morning dress and top hats for men, and hats or substantial headpieces for women, remain part of the picture. In 2012 the organisers set a minimum size for headwear, a headpiece with a solid base of at least four inches, after years of ever smaller fascinators.
Thursday is for the Gold Cup
The Gold Cup, first run in 1807, is the oldest of the meeting's great races and the centrepiece of Thursday, long known as Ladies' Day. It is a test of stamina over about two and a half miles, and the horses that win it are often the toughest stayers in Europe. The modern star of the race was Yeats, who won it four years running from 2006 to 2009 for trainer Aidan O'Brien. In 2013 came a royal first, when the Queen's horse Estimate won the Gold Cup. It was the first time a reigning monarch had owned the winner of the race, and Ascot's crowd roared accordingly. The week also has some of the most dramatic sprints in racing. Frankel won the Queen Anne Stakes by 11 lengths in 2012, and in the same week Black Caviar, the unbeaten Australian sprinter, won the Diamond Jubilee Stakes by a whisker.
The jockeys who made Ascot their own
Lester Piggott dominated the course for decades, riding more than 100 winners at the meeting and taking the Gold Cup a record 11 times. His laconic, intense style made him a legend before he had said a word to the press. Frankie Dettori is the personality the crowd adores. His flying dismounts became a trademark, and he has ridden dozens of Royal Ascot winners. His greatest day came at Ascot on 28 September 1996, outside the royal meeting, when he won all seven races on the card. The feat became known as the Magnificent Seven, and it turned a card of racing into front-page news.
Black Ascot and other times it all changed
Ascot has marked the moments when the nation's mood changed. After Edward VII died in May 1910, racegoers arrived in black, and the meeting became known as Black Ascot. It remains one of the most striking images in racing. In 2005 the whole meeting moved to York because the grandstand was being rebuilt. The redeveloped course reopened in 2006, and the Royal Ascot tradition came home. Then came 2020, when the meeting was run behind closed doors during the pandemic. There were no hats on parade, no carriages in front of a crowd and no singing, a reminder of how much of Ascot is the people.
The singalong at the end of the day
When the last race is over, crowds gather around the bandstand and sing. Hats get waved, and the formal week ends with a communal chorus that has little to do with the sport. That is the secret of Royal Ascot's long life. It mixes serious racing, royal ceremony, fashion and a good-humoured crowd. Few events combine a Gold Cup, a horse-drawn carriage and a few hundred thousand people in their best clothes.
Notable people
- Queen Anne
- George III
- George IV
- Queen Elizabeth II
- Lester Piggott
- Frankie Dettori
- Aidan O'Brien
- Frankel
- Black Caviar
- Yeats
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