Britain's Queen Elizabeth can predict how well her horses will do at Royal Ascot based on her daily carriage procession.
Queen Elizabeth
The 90-year-old monarch has had a long passion for racing and over her years at the prestigious meeting, she has learned to listen to the sound of the carriage wheels and the hooves on the track as she makes her way through the course in order to assess whether conditions will suit her own runners.
Juliet Slot, Commercial Director of Royal Ascot, discovered the queen's secret while the racecourse was making a series of films in celebration with the monarch's love of the race meeting.
She explained to the Daily Telegraph newspaper: "Every day of the meeting, the royal procession takes a slightly different route up the track to preserve the course, and people say the sound of the procession going past gives a very good indication of the going.
"The Queen has developed such a good ear for it that she can tell as her carriage is coming up the track just what the conditions are going to be."
Despite her love of the sport, the queen's daughter, Princess Anne, admitted much of her mother's career as an equine breeder is partly due to duty.
She explained in 'The Queen's Horses': "The queen's interest in horses, being brought up riding, was always there. At what point that became much more of a method and a discipline on the breeding side I'm not quite sure. I think she also felt that there was a responsibility on her to maintain the bloodlines that has been established over many generations, and something she would have hated to have lost in her time."
Since attending Royal Ascot for the first time in 1947, the queen has attended every day of every year's meeting, and seen 22 of her horses romp to victory as she cheered them on from the royal box.
Her biggest win at the meeting came in 2013 when she became the first reigning monarch to win the Gold Cup when her horse Estimate was victorious.
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