Defeat for their champion at Ascot yesterday ended an unusually torrid week for Coolmore. Found guilty of using team tactics at a British Horseracing Authority enquiry late last week, trainer Aidan O’Brien and jockey Johnny Murtagh were unable to find any sort of solace on the racetrack as Henrythenavigator, the star miler of the season, was finally hunted down by Raven’s Pass in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

The chase has provided a persistent backbeat to a memorable season. Three times, Raven’s Pass has given best to “Henry”, three times there were excuses, but at last finding a strategy and ground suited to his style of racing, the three-year-old romped home to bring trainer John Gosden and jockey Jimmy Fortune a Group One double after Rainbow View had advertised her class in the Fillies Mile.

For once, the use of a pacemaker backfired on Coolmore as Colm O’Donoghue, who with Murtagh was handed a seven-day ban for his part in Duke of Marmalade’s controversial win in the Juddmonte International at Newmarket last month, failed dismally to gear his front-running to the pace of the rest of the field.

Once Olivier Peslier, on Racinger, himself a pacemaker for the French horse Tamayuz, had realised the mistake and eased off, Henrythenavigator was left to fend for himself against both his main rivals, which was not in the Coolmore plan. As Racinger tired coming into the closing stages, Fortune had Raven’s Pass handily placed to get first run. For once, at the end of a long, hard season, “Henry” could find no adequate response to the surge. “We finally got it right,” said Gosden. “It’s a big win. It’s been a big day.”

O’Brien confirmed afterwards that he would not be appealing against the £5,000 fine handed down by the BHA nor the bans for Murtagh, Coolmore’s stable jockey, and O’Donoghue. The whole business of what does and does not constitute team tactics needs to be clarified once the dust has settled on an issue that has provoked a considerable – and unnecessary – amount of indignation in recent weeks. The final sentence was probably about right, whatever the protests from Coolmore, but if the stewards had acted on the day or the BHA had spotted the problem before it escalated into banner headlines, a great season for Coolmore and for the public would not have been so sadly soured.

Henrythenavigator lost nothing in defeat. He looked a picture as ever in the parade ring, deep-chested and strong, a proper miler and a contrast to the slighter, much less imposing Tamayuz, who arrived at Ascot on the back of three Group 1 victories across the Channel for Freddie Head. With Raven’s Pass standing his ground for the home team, this was a true three-cornered contest for Europe’s mile championship.

After the race, Gosden could at last mount an argument for Raven’s Pass, who has run his big chestnut heart out from spring to autumn without due reward. No and fast on Jukebox Jury to take the Group 2 Royal Lodge Stakes for Mark Johnston and Turner confirmed her growing status by driving Furnace to victory in the big handicap. But this was the day justice was done, by Raven’s Pass. wonder Jimmy Fortune wanted to orchestrate a proper reception from a record crowd for QEII day as the 3/1 victor returned to the winner’s enclosure.

Earlier on the card, Rainbow View had confirmed her place as the winter favourite for the 1,000 Guineas with an impressive win, her fourth of the season, in the Meon Valley Stud Fillies Mile.

Though showing signs of sweating up on an unseasonally warm afternoon, Rainbow View showed an eye-catching turn of foot and real professionalism in overhauling Luca Cumani’s Fantasia in the final furlong. Whether 7/4 is good value for the 1,000 Guineas, however, is another matter.

Two former champion apprentices, Royston Ffrench and Hayley Turner, the former returning to fashion, the latter all the rage at present, were among the winning jockeys on the undercard. Ffrench arrived late