Last year’s race Winner: Changingoftheguard Jockey: Ryan L Moore Trainer: Aidan P O'Brien Owner: Westerberg/Mrs. J Magnier/Mrs. Tabor/Mrs. D Smith Age: 3  Weight: 9st 2lbs Starting Price: 11/10 Season Form Figures: 115 Previous Best: 1st - Chester Vase Stakes (Group 3), Chester (May 2022) By Paul Jones The King Edward VII Stakes (Group 2) has very much been a punter-friendly race with 19 of the last 29 winners starting favourite or second favourite aided by just one double-figure field in the last 11 years. Eight winners since 1989 ran in the Derby so no real steer one way or the other there.   You can’t knock its recent roll of honour as four of the last five winners went on to win a Group 1. In addition, two other fairly recent winners went on to win the Dubai World Cup (Monterosso) and King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes (Nathaniel) and the 2014 runner-up later won the Cox Plate (Adelaide) so the race often referred to as the Ascot Derby has been a big guide to the very biggest races on the planet in recent years. Also note that as many as ten of the last 29 subsequent St Leger winners have run with credit here so stamina genes counts for plenty.   Sir Michael Stoute has six wins to his credit since 1991 (also won it with the brilliant Irish Derby winner Shareef Dancer in 1983 who never ran again after that success at The Curragh) and that should have been more one as the subsequent dual Breeders’ Cup Turf winner, Conduit, was given too much to do and won the St Leger later in the season. Also respect the Johnston and Gosden stable that have won this race three times apiece.   The Irish, however, have only mustered three wins in the last 48 years (all three trained by Aidan O’Brien) and one of those was in a very poor five-runner renewal. O’Brien’s Derby runners have had mixed fortunes. Japan hacked up in 2019 after going close at Epsom but Ballydoyle have been responsible for five of the last nine losing favourites (four of which started at no bigger than 6/5), two of which ran big races in the Derby plus his At First Sight was also only fifth here as favourite in 2010 after finishing second in the Derby. Changingoftheguard did justify 11/10 favouritism for the stable last year after he was fifth at Epsom, but the fellow Derby runner, Grand Alliance, really did throw it away hanging badly left late on and only beaten a short-head. Of the last 27 winners, all but five were winning a Group race for the first time and, of the last 28 winners, only eight had failed to visit the Winners' Enclosure earlier in the season. Sixteen of those winners had contested a recognised Derby trial.   As with the Ribblesdale Stakes (the fillies' equivalent of this race at Royal Ascot), proven two-year-old form counts for little. In fact, the 2014 winner, Eagle Top, was given his racecourse debut just nine weeks before he won this prize and the 2015 winner, Balios, ran only once as a two-year-old as late as November and just once beforehand in his three-year-old campaign. So, this has proven to be very much a race for unexposed horses likely to show their true potential when sent over this distance for the first time and 23 of the last 27 winners had not previously won over 1m4f so the majority were unexposed at this trip. At a glance summary Positives: The favourite or second-favourite Contested a recognised Derby Trial Yet to win over 1m4f+ Trained by Sir Michael Stoute or the Gosden and Johnston stables Negatives: Non-Aidan O’Brien-trained Irish contenders