“Am I?” William Buick said here on Friday, when told he is third-favourite to be top jockey at Royal Ascot next week. But while it came as a surprise to the man himself, a glance through his book of rides shows a mixture of big chances and live possibilities that, if everything falls right, might turn him into a contender.
Buick is a 12-1 chance to win the Royal meeting’s riders’ title for the first time, while Frankie Dettori, at 9-2, is the only other jockey who stands any realistic chance of deposing Ryan Moore, the 1-3 favourite, according to the betting. Moore has finished in front in six of the last seven seasons and set a post-war record for winners at a single Royal Ascot with nine in 2015. Jim Crowley, the reigning champion jockey on the Flat, is a 33-1 chance to translate that success to the Royal meeting, while Silvestre de Sousa, who rode five winners on the card here on Friday, is the same price.
Dettori, Moore and Buick are, quite simply, the only riders with enough strength in depth behind them next week to consider themselves contenders and Buick is likely to find out almost immediately whether it is going to be one of the biggest weeks of his career.
Ribchester, his mount in the opening Queen Anne Stakes, is the first of five short-priced favourites in Royal Ascot’s Group One events that could inflict a great deal of pain on the bookmakers. The other four will all be ridden by Moore but Ribchester is the one that could set the ball rolling and his jockey is confident that on his best form he will be very hard to beat.
“He’s the best horse in the race,” Buick says. “He used to be very energetic at home and it was hard to channel his energy in the right direction,” Buick says. “They’ve done a great job with him [at Richard Fahey’s Yorkshire stable] and now that he seems to have really grown up and got his act together he’s just a quality horse on all fronts.
“He’s a fast horse but he sees the mile out really well and he’s also a horse that’s still improving. At Ascot and on fast ground everything is going to be in his favour. Put all that together and he must have a very good chance.”
Buick’s 16 winners at Royal Ascot to date put him in fourth place in the list of currently licensed jockeys, behind Dettori, Moore and Jamie Spencer. But even for this relative veteran of the meeting every ride at Royal Ascot is special.
“I’ve been riding for 10 years now and I’ve been at Royal Ascot most of those years and I was lucky enough to ride a winner early on [aboard Dark Missile in the 2007 Wokingham Handicap],” he says. “It was a surreal experience and every year when you come back you still get that buzz. Having a winner there means just as much and it is just as important.
“It’s a hectic week with a lot of expectation but it’s enjoyable too. When everything’s put together it’s a very special week.
“It’s racing’s Olympics. It’s what we all look forward to, every owner, trainer, jockey and breeder. The horses are prepared for this from a long time out.”
The Royal meeting is also of supreme importance to the Godolphin operation, Buick’s principal employer, and it is now 13 years since Saeed bin-Suroor and Frankie Dettori became the last Godolphin trainer and jockey to take their respective titles over the week.
Godolphin’s best chances are spread around a number of trainers but Buick has the lion’s share of the rides, including Jack Hobbs, the probable favourite for the Prince of Wales’s Stakes on Wednesday. And he holds out high hopes for Blue Point, his partner in Friday’s Commonwealth Cup, which is seen by many as the best race of the week.
“He was very impressive when he won at Ascot earlier in the year,” Buick says. “I know that he was getting 4lb from [the runner-up] Harry Angel [another leading contender for Friday’s race], and then Harry Angel went and won the Sandy Lane very impressively at Haydock.
“Blue Point is a horse that we have great belief in and he’s showing a lot of speed at home. He ran in the [seven-furlong] Dewhurst last year and didn’t quite see it out. He’s a really quick horse, all about speed, and he’s very effective at six furlongs.
“It’s going to be a hell of a spectacle. With [last year’s Coventry Stakes winner] Caravaggio in there as well, I think you can be sure they will finish one, two and three, but it’s a question of what order?”
If Buick is to stand any chance of toppling Moore, he will surely need to back up the Group One horses with at least one success at bigger odds. Aqabah, who returns to fast going after struggling on soft ground last time out, is one possibility in Tuesday’s Coventry Stakes, while the unexposed Culturati will be a live contender if he takes his chance in next Saturday’s Wokingham Handicap.
Buick rode five winners at Royal Ascot five years ago but lost out on the riders’ title on countback when Moore took the last of the 30 races. If any jockey is to bring Moore’s run of Royal Ascot success to an unexpected halt next week, Buick would be a popular and deserving choice to do it.
