King Charles Has Picked Up Right Where Queen Elizabeth Left Off When It Comes to 1 of Her Majesty’s Favorite Hobbies
King Charles III is forging his own path as the new monarch of the United Kingdom. However, he is continuing the late Queen Elizabeth II’s legacy when it comes to one of Her Majesty’s favorite hobbies — horse racing. After selling a few of his mother’s horses because “you can’t keep them all,” the new sovereign is picking up where she left off by sending off four juveniles to training for the upcoming racing season.
King Charles sold some of Queen Elizabeth’s horses after she died
Queen Elizabeth was an avid breeder of racehorses during her lifetime, and she also enjoyed riding and attended races. After her death in September 2022, King Charles chose to sell 14 of her horses through the Tattersalls auction house.
The horses sold included Love Affairs — her last winner at Goodwood just two days before her death– who was trained by Clive Cox. Another high profile horse sold was Just Fine, trained by Sir Michael Stoute.
“It’s nothing out of the ordinary. Every year they would sell horses,” Tattersall’s spokesman Jimmy George told the BBC. “The Queen had brood mares of her own, she would breed them and sell them. You can’t keep them all. Every year owners sell stock. His Majesty is just doing what owners do.”
The late queen inherited the Royal Stud — a racehorse breeding center at Sandringham that produced a number of winners — from her father King George VI.
“I’m sure if the Queen had not been bred into being a monarch she would have found a vocation with horses. It was just simply in her DNA,” the queen’s racing manager John Warren said.
His Majesty has picked up right where Queen Elizabeth left off
Selling the horses wasn’t a sign that King Charles was ending the royal household’s connection with horse racing. He recently sent four of the queen’s juvenile horses to trainer Ralph Beckett in Andover to prepare for the upcoming racing season.
Per Express, Becket is a flat racing expert who was approached by the king to train the four horses, which were bred at the Royal Stud. One of the animals he is training is the sister of the queen’s sprinter King’s Lynn, which took part in the King’s Stand Stakes at Ascot last year — winning the Group 2 Temple Stakes. Another horse is the half-sister of Diploma, who was trained by Stoute.
The queen reportedly split her horses between 11 different trainers. But, it was actually Charles who hired Beckett back in 2008 to train the first horse that he bred with Camilla, the queen consort.
“When he told me the plan I did a double-take. It’s a real honor and very exciting,” Beckett said.
King Charles doesn’t have a passion for horses like his late mother
When King Charles sold off 14 of the queen’s horses at auction to reduce the royal racing stock by one-third, the sale brought in £1million. The connection between the royal family and the horse-racing industry will continue after the queen’s death, but there will be some significant changes.
“The desire is to continue with the traditions and connections with Royal Ascot but not on the same scale as Her Majesty because she had a passion,’ an insider explained.
Queen Elizabeth received her first horse, a Shetland pony, at the age of four and owned dozens of horses throughout her life. She usually sold around seven each year as part of the “natural churn” of her collection.
