Alpha Centauri stamps her class on Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot

“It’s over quicker, which is great,” Jessica Harrington said after winning the Coronation Stakes with Alpha Centauri here on Friday, when asked about the difference between racing on the Flat and over jumps. On that basis her latest Group One win on the Flat must have been her idea of the perfect race, as it was over almost before it had started in earnest.

Alpha Centauri was one of three 1,000 Guineas winners in the field for the feature race on Friday, but she was travelling much better than any of her opponents from the start and was still cruising on the bridle as they lined up for home with just over two furlongs to run.

As soon as Colm O’Donoghue, her jockey, asked for an effort, Alpha Centauri accelerated clear and added to her lead all the way to the line, which she crossed six lengths in front of Threading in a track-record time. Billesdon Brook, the 66-1 winner of the 1,000 Guineas at Newmarket, was another three-and-a-half lengths behind in fourth, while Teppal, who took the French 1,000 Guineas, trailed home in ninth.

Harrington made her name as a National Hunt trainer but her Flat operation has expanded significantly in recent years and she now has as many Flat horses as jumpers in her stable. She is one of only a handful of trainers to have won the Champion Hurdle, Champion Chase and Gold Cup at Cheltenham and has proved equally adept at winning top races on the level, though Alpha Centauri’s win was both her first at the Royal meeting and her first in a British Group One.

Harrington said: “It’s 50-50 and it’s grand because I’ve got lots of people to work for me and all the family, both daughters are working for me now and I’m about to get my son-in-law. I don’t quite know what’s going to happen then but I hope we’ll all get on well together.

“I’m relieved firstly, because I got quite wound up before the race. I was nervous today because I know she’s very good and it was rather nice when we went to the Irish Guineas because we were a bit under the radar. Today we were favourite and there to be shot at.

“Colm was very confident on her and she settled great. I thought he’d got to the front a bit soon but the further she went, the better she went.”

Alpha Centauri is clearly the best three-year-old filly of the current crop by some margin, at least when the ground is fast, and she could now take on colts and older horses in the Prix Jacques le Marois at Deauville in August.

Jim Crowley’s build-up to the Royal meeting took an unfortunate turn when he needed stitches in a cut lip following a weighing-room brawl with Raul da Silva, but the former champion jockey was the centre of attention for the right reasons here on Friday as he guided Eqtidaar to victory in the Group One Commonwealth Cup.

This was Crowley’s second Group One winner for the owner Sheikh Hamdan al Maktoum, who hired him as retained rider at the end of his championship season in 2016, and his first in Britain in the blue-and-white colours.

“Eqtidaar was one of my best rides of the week and it’s great he could pull it off,” Crowley said. “He is trained by a master [in Sir Michael Stoute] and just keeps on improving.

“Things did not pan out [when he was fourth at Newbury] last time as we were on the wrong part of the track, whereas today we got a lovely tow into the race and it went like clockwork really. He had been working unbelievably well and you could make excuses for his last two starts.”

Charlie Appleby already has the Derby winner in his stable thanks to the success of Masar at Epsom earlier this month and he added another earlier on the card when Old Persian took the “Ascot Derby”, as the King Edward VII Stakes is familiarly known.

William Buick settled Old Persian close to the pace from the off and he stayed on strongly in the straight to finish a length and three quarters in front of Rostropovich and give Buick his third winner of the meeting.

“William made a great manoeuvre after the first two or three furlongs,” Appleby said. “He just sat on Frankie’s quarters [behind the leader Raa Atoll], because we know Frankie [Dettori] on the front end is always dangerous. When everyone was stacked up behind, I knew he was in the right place. He said the St Leger could be something to keep an eye on but I’m happy to stay at a mile and a half, given the pace he has shown at shorter trips, and I’ve put him in the [Group One] Grand Prix de Paris, which is one option.”

Ryan Moore and Dettori both drew a blank on the fourth day, and Buick is now tied with Moore in second place in the race to be the week’s leading jockey. Dettori with four winners, is still in control, but the tight race will add extra spice to the meeting’s final day on Saturday.