Frankie Dettori issues glowing report on Cracksman for Royal Ascot
(The Guardian Sports News)

o Italian rider is second-favourite to be top jockey next weeko Cracksman is hot favourite for the Prince of Wales´s StakesA year to the day after the injury which forced him to sit out last year´s Royal Ascot, Frankie Dettori said here on Thursday that he is taking no chances ahead of Flat racing´s showpiece meeting next week. `I´ve got three rides before Tuesday, two on Saturday and one on Sunday,` Dettori said. `The Derby is one race, Royal Ascot is 30. It´s our Olympics. It means everything, basically.`A glance at his book of rides next week shows why Dettori is treading carefully. Ascot is `his` turf, the track where he rode all seven winners back in September 1996, a feat that is commemorated by a bronze of the rider performing his trademark flying dismount by the main gate. Yet Dettori has not finished the Royal meeting as the leading jockey since his six-winner week in 2004 and the betting suggests that he may never get a better chance to do so for the sixth time in all. Continue reading...