Currently scheduled as the second race on the third day of Royal Ascot, the King George V Stakes is a 0-105 ‘Heritage’ handicap, run over a mile and a half, restricted to three-year-olds and worth £110,000 in prize money. The race was inaugurated in 1946, but did not become part of the Royal Ascot programme until two years later. Two of the most prolific riders on the Flat, Lester Piggott and Pat Eddery, remain the leading jockeys in the history of the King George V Stakes with four winners apiece, while the most prolific trainer, Mark Johnston, who relinquished his role as joint-trainer with his son, Charlie, in late 2023, remains the leading handler with six winners.
The last 10 renewals of the King George V Stakes have produced just two winning favourites, one of them a joint-favourite, two second-favourites, a third-favourite and two other runners sent off at single-figure prices have been successful in that period. The longer-priced winners were South Pacific at 22/1 in 2019, Desert Hero at 18/1 in 2023 and Hukum at 12/1 in 2020. Desert Hero was notable for being a first Royal Ascot winner for the King and Queen, while Hukum went on to win the Coronation Cup at Epsom and the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot, both Grade 1 contests, later in his career.
Interestingly, trainers Ralph Beckett and William Haggas have both saddled two winners apiece in the last five renewals, Surefire (2021) and Going The Distance (2024) in the case of the former and Desert Hero (2023) and Merchant (2025) in the case of the latter. Of that quartet, Surefire,
Going The Distance and Merchant all won on their previous start, as did the 2022 winner, Secret State, trained by Charlie Appleby, confirming the trend for recent last-time-out winners following up in the King George V Stakes.