Look ahead to the Queen Mary Clive Brittain is brimming with confidence ahead of Rizeena in the Queen Mary Stakes at Royal Ascot on Wednesday. The veteran Newmarket handler has won 16 races at the Royal meeting but the Queen Mary is one that has eluded him and he is hoping the daughter of Iffraaj can put that right in the Group Two over five furlongs. She goes into the race at the top of her game on the back of victory in the Listed National Stakes at Sandown. "James Doyle came in to sit on her this morning and he was very happy with her. She'd done all the work. I just wanted him to get a feel of her and he liked her a lot," said Brittain. "We are going there with a jockey who knows the filly and is full of confidence. I'm confident too. Everything she has done up to know suggests she is above average. "That last race will have brought her on because she was still a trifle green that day. The third run is what she needed to put her right for Ascot." Clive Cox also has a major chance with Beldale Memory, who won a Listed race at York and is unbeaten in two starts. "I'm very happy with her. I was delighted with the way she won at York," said the Lambourn trainer. "She's a very laid-back filly at home, she's trained very well and I'm very much looking forward to her running tomorrow. "She's a beautiful filly to deal with and I think a similar performance to York will put her bang there." Richard Hannon has five Queen Mary wins on his CV and has no less than four runners - Corncockle, Fast, Fig Roll and Oriel - this time. "Hughesie (Richard Hughes) has opted for Oriel, taking the view that the filly should be going there with a one next to her name," the trainer told www.richardhannonracing.co.uk. "He held his hands up after Newbury, where she was beaten at odds-on, but he was trying to teach her something before this race, and things just did not work out. "She has worked well since and we still think that she is a very good filly, and it will take a good one to beat her. "We won this for Julie Wood with Gilded (2006), and we have kept the dream alive that lightning might strike twice since Fast made a winning debut for her at Chepstow five weeks ago. "She is only a pony and was a cheap purchase, but she lives up to her name, and, though this is a huge jump in class, she is very well. "We also run Fig Roll and Corncockle, who finished third and sixth respectively in the Listed race at Naas earlier this month. "Fig Roll is only small and probably wants six furlongs, but this is a stiff five and she will be staying on at the end, as will Corncockle, who was sticking on in Ireland and has already won over six at Newmarket." Hughes explained he chose Oriel because he feels she has quality. "I was trying to teach her how to race properly (at Newbury). If I'd let her go I'd have been three lengths clear the whole way and wouldn't have seen another horse, but we'd have gone to Ascot without learning anything," the jockey told Sky Sports Radio. "I buried her in and didn't get the run when I needed it, so I was a bit unlucky. "I have a lot of belief in her. I think she's a very good filly."
