Well, as I suspected and despite opposing him due to lack of value, Yeats did create Royal Ascot history with his stunning fourth win in the Gold Cup. The Aidan O’Brien trained star, ridden by Johnny Murtagh’s had started the race as a 6-4 favorite despite his dismal performance at Navan.

His immaculate performance at Royal Ascot on Ladies’ Day, really did prove to be a crowd thriller
Once Murtagh managed to get Yeats to maintain a steady pace, there was nothing holding him back from winning the two and a half mile showpiece. Even the chase given by the young pretender Patkai did not stop the eight year old from a momentous victory.

Patkai managed to end up three and a half lengths behind Yeats, while the runner up for the past two years and my tip, Geordieland had to be content with third place this time.

Murtagh said that just as Muhammad Ali told everyone, and was the greatest, Yeats too had managed to prove to everyone that he is the ultimate heavyweight champion. He said that the defeat at Navan was because of the soft ground, and tried to tell everyone this.

However no one believed him, and instead, people were picking holes in Yeats. As I previously mentioned in my blog, I too felt the ground was unsuitable, however we should still not underestimate what an achievement this fourth consecutive Gold Cup win is.

O’Brien said that as he was sick that morning, and that he hadn’t expected this win to materialize. He stated that at the start of the race, they knew that they would not get this opportunity to create history again and knew they had to put their best in the race.

However as Yeats loves fast ground and Royal Ascot, it was only natural for him to come alive for this race. And come alive he did, winning an unprecedented fourth title on the bounce – in the end much to frustration!