Palmer can consider nice options for promising Laureate Crown

Hugo Palmer’s Laureate Crown could be set for bigger things after a regal performance on debut at Ascot.

The Fitri Hay-owned son of Victor Ludorum made smooth progress under a typically patient Jamie Spencer ride to register a taking opening victory in what looked a useful novice event.

Connections are now eyeing a step into stakes company, with Goodwood’s Coral Vintage Stakes (July 29) that Palmer won with his Classic hero Galileo Gold in 2015 a possible option alongside a move up to a mile for Salisbury’s Stonehenge Stakes on August 13.

Palmer said: “He was only just ready to start so overcame greenness and I particularly thought Jamie Spencer’s default position suits a horse like that so nicely because the horse was allowed time to find his feet and relax into the race.

“He wasn’t put under any pressure and if it happened it happened and if it didn’t there would be another day, so I was delighted to see it all come together. The Vintage has to now come into consideration, (but) he’s quite a big horse, so I don’t know if Goodwood is necessarily the perfect spot for him and he might also be ready for a mile relatively soon.

“The Stonehenge at Salisbury might be more suitable, but we’ll just have to see.

“You would hope he is up to running in stakes company and being such a big horse I hope there’s much more to come from him.”

Although Laureate Crown’s Qatar Goodwood Festival participation is still to be decided, one who will be in action on the Sussex Downs is his stablemate Seagulls Eleven.

Owned by the Two Plus Three Two Plus Four syndicate which includes Premier League footballers James Milner and Danny Welbeck, the three-year-old chased home Charlie Appleby’s Opera Bello in the Sir Henry Cecil Stakes at Newmarket last week.

That second-place effort follows a respectable run in the Jersey Stakes at Royal Ascot, with the Manor House handler now pointing his charge towards the Group Three Bonhams Thoroughbred Stakes at Goodwood (August 1).

“He seems to be back on track and he just met a good one on Thursday, I think, but I was delighted with the way he ran,” continued Palmer.

“I would have thought the Thoroughbred Stakes would be an obvious spot for him.”