2025 Champions Day Ascot Preview & Tips – DS
2025 Champions Day Ascot Preview
I have already posted four selections for a Champions Day e/w lucky 15, you can check that preview out here. With extra places now available for a couple of races, we’ll have another look at the card now, Dave’s 2025 Champions Day Ascot preview is below.
12.55 – British Champions Long Distance Cup (Group 1)
Just five runners will go to post in this 2m contest (the smallest field I can remember) and it is not a betting race for me. Trawlerman is odds on and should win, though Sweet William might make a race of it. No bet.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: No bet
1.30 – British Champions Day 2yo Conditions Stakes (Class 2)
Where did this abomination come from? I must have missed the memo. Having six races was perfect in my eyes but the powers that be have managed to sneak this 6f conditions race for 2yos onto the card.
The top four horses in the betting are owned by Godolphin, Wathnan, Coolmore and Cheveley Park and they will likely mop up most of the £250k purse. Ardisia, who has returned form figures of 1311 since yours truly tipped him up for the Super Sprint, looks most likely to challenge the leading lights. However, he’ll be having his 11th start of the season and I worry that this might be one run too many for him.
None of the big outsiders really make much appeal and my record in these sorts of races is diabolical so the percentage call is to leave it well alone. No bet.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: No bet
2.05 – British Champion Sprint Stakes (Group 1)
We have already backed Run To Freedom for this race. He’s been drawn in stall 9 and Henry Candy has booked Rob Hornby for the ride. He is 4-29 for Candy with seven top 4s and if you had £1 on every ride he has had for the stable at SP, you’d be +£27.40.
The son of Muhaarar is hovering at around the 66-1 mark and he’s unlikely to shorten. If anything, a raceday drift is more likely and with extra places on offer, I’ll probably go in again if he hits 80s or 100s. It’s best to wait until best odds guaranteed are available before backing him again though.
I am also going to have a small e/w interest on No Half Measures. She announced herself at the top table when landing the July Cup earlier this season at odds of 66/1. Yes, she’s been beaten since in the Sprint Cup but she met all sorts of trouble in running so you can put a line through that.
This filly has won seven of her fifteen starts, has been in the first three in ten of those races and she’s only been beaten further than 2.75l twice in his career. 25/1 looks a very generous price about this daughter of Cable Bay given how consistent she is and at those odds, she is worth chancing each way.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: Run To Freedom already advised @ 50/1; No Half Measures e/w @ 25/1 (4 places)
2.45 – British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes (Group 1)
A relatively open race. Kalpana currently heads the market at 3/1 with Estrange next best at 4s. Given that Kalpana is rated 122 and Estrange 112, it is a bit surprising that the Balding filly isn’t a lot shorter but she has yet to win in 2025 and it is starting to look like that lofty rating might flatter the daughter of Study Of Man.
Our Arc bet Quisisana pitches up here and she’ll be well suited to the return to better ground. She just couldn’t pick up on the rain sodden ground at Longchamp and on this surface, she should be able to demonstrate her turn of foot.
There isn’t much juice left in her odds of 7/1 though and it is only 13 days since the Arc so the percentage call is to leave her alone. If the ground was softer I’d be interested in Danielle at a price but her four best efforts have come on good to soft, soft and heavy.
Unfortunately, this will have to be another no bet race.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: No bet
3.25 – Queen Elizabeth II Stakes (Group 1)
We are already on Ascot specialist Docklands at 14s and with the ground to suit, hopefully he will acquit himself well again at his favourite venue. The other one I’m going to back here with four places now on offer is the 2023 and 2024 runner up, Facteur Cheval.
Given his record in this race, he has surely been trained to the minute for it. On his last start in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes at the Royal Meeting, he trailed in a well beaten eighth but his stamina was stretched by the 1m2f trip that day.
On his last start at 1m he finished second to Charyn in this last year (on soft) and overall, his career form figures at the trip read 111124132232632. All things considered, 20-1 about a horse of his calibre is a bit of an insult and at the odds, he has to be worth backing e/w.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: Docklands already advised @ 14/1; Facteur Cheval e/w @ 20/1 (4 places) nb
4.05 – Champion Stakes (Group 1)
We have backed Almaqam at 12/1 for this earlier in the week and he’s been absolutely friendless since. He has now drifted out to as big as 20/1 in some places so hopefully he hasn’t lost a leg. I’m happy to stick to my guns here, hopefully Kieran Shoemark gives him a good, positive ride and sneaks him into the money.
2025 Champions Day Ascot Tip: Almaqam already advised e/w @ 12/1
4.40 – Balmoral Handicap (Heritage)
When tipping Greek Order for this I was hoping that Christophe Soumillon, who won this for Bell last year, would get the ride. However, Bell has instead decided to book the red hot claimer Jack Callan, who will take off a handy 5lbs. He’ll also wear cheekpieces for the first time. The 25s has gone now and he’s as short as 10s with a few firms, hopefully the market confidence is justified.
He’s been drawn in stall 20, so it makes sense to back one drawn lower too, just in case there’s a big draw bias. Given his record in this race (three wins since 2017), David O’Meara’s runners are always worth a second look. He is triple handed this year with Bopedro (3), Cerulean Bay (5), and Theoryofeverything (6).
Still Capable
The former horse is the one that interests me. Yes, he’s a nine year old now but he’s still capable of producing very smart form and he’s been on the premises in three of his last four starts.
Back in June he ran in the Hunt Cup off a mark of 96 and he was only beaten 1.25l into third from a similarly low draw (Greek Order a neck behind in fourth) on quick ground. In 2023 he was beaten 2.5l into fourth in this race off 102 and this year, he rocks up off a mark of 94.
Mark Winn rides, which suggests he’s the stable’s third string but O’Meara’s three previous winners of this have been ridden by Tudhope, Kirby and Watson so I wouldn’t read too much into jockey arrangements. Winn got a good tune out of Bopedro when he was fourth on him at Doncaster two runs ago, hopefully he does so again at odds of 22/1.
