Frankel will seek to rubberstamp his standing as the world’s greatest ever racehorse in the appropria-tely named Champion Stakes at Ascot on Champions Day today.

However, to win his 14th race in 14 starts, in what is widely expected to be his final bow, the four-year-old colt – named after the late Bobby Frankel a former trainer of the horse’s owner Prince Khalid Abdullah – faces his greatest test.

While he has just four serious rivals – his older brother Bullet Train will fulfil his usual role as pacemaker – they include last year’s winner Cirrus des Aigles and Nathaniel, who to date has got the closest of all Frankel’s rivals beaten half a length on the champion’s debut two years ago.

Frankel, who will be bidding for his 10th Group One success, will also be running over 1 1/4 miles for only the second time and also on his least favoured soft ground, all combining to give his rivals some reason to be optimistic.

However, his legendary trainer Henry Cecil, who says he is the best horse he has ever seen, says soft should not be a problem although if it deteriorated to heavy, then alarm bells will start ringing.

“I’m pretty confident he will be fine in soft ground but if it’s heavy, we are in no man’s land,” said 69-year-old Cecil, who has been sustained by Frankel’s exploits while undergoing treatment for throat cancer.

“He has never encountered it and with his action and turn of foot, I cannot be sure he would appreciate it.”

However, Cecil, who has experienced some of his greatest moments at Ascot including a record 70 winners at the Royal meeting, said Frankel was in prime form for his task.

“I could not be happier with him. He seems full of himself.”

Prince Khaled’s racing manager Teddy Grimthorpe ackno-wledges that with German Derby winner Pastorius also in the field, Frankel faces his greatest challenge.

“Certainly this is his toughest test,” said Grimthorpe.

“It’s building up to be a really true test for him. I think it’s really exciting.

“I’ve always come into this with the attitude that we have to enjoy him. The horse has done everything that we could possibly have dreamt about and I hope he’ll run a huge race on Saturday (today).”

Frankel is understandably the main attraction but the rest of the card is strong and the other Group One race, the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes, will feature a horse that came off second best no fewer than four times to Frankel.

However, Excelebration – who never got nearer than four lengths to Frankel and the last time they met lost by 11 lengths – should improve on his second spot last year and pick up his second successive Group One win.

Ironically, in winning it will only go to support those that believe Frankel is the greatest ever.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.