Frankly Darling wins the Ribblesdale

Anthony Oppenheimer's homebred filly Frankly Darling was an impressive winner of the Gr.2 Ribblesdale Stakes on the opening day of Royal Ascot on Tuesday (16th June).

​In doing so, she became the 50th Northern Hemisphere-bred stakes winner for her sire Frankel, who has an incredible 17% stakes winners to runners and 13% stakes winners to foals of racing age (not including current two-year-olds).

Frankly Darling is bred on the same Frankel/Daylami cross as last season's track record-breaking Gr.1 St Leger winner Logician.

Winning jockey, Frankie Dettori, commented: "She ran with the choke out a bit and I was pleased that Josephine [Gordon] was there to make a good pace." He continued: "I got her to relax on the turn for home and she had every chance to get tired, but found another gear and it was a very good performance. We were burning plenty of petrol in the first half of the race and she has got some lungs, let me tell you."

Frankly Darling's trainer, John, Gosden said: “Frankly Darling is a lovely filly. She was a big, rangy girl and a bit unfurnished who needed time to develop. She’s still learning; as you can see, she was a little wild, there’s a bit of Frankel about her - ‘I want to run and it’s my business if I want to run, not the jockey’s’ - but she showed an awful lot of class today. I think we have one Oaks filly only and we don’t have anything remotely related to a Derby horse. That is the way it is.”