OF course, we take Royal Ascot for granted. Like Wimbledon and the Open golf, like Cheltenham and the first ball bowled in an Ashes Test, we’ve seen it all before.

We are interested, fascinated even and wouldn’t miss it for the world but we see it through the eyes of hardened veterans.

What wouldn’t we give to be like the young Steve Cauthen, gazing open-mouthed at the tumultuous throng in the grandstand, happy to stay on long after the Queen Alexandra and sing along to She’s A Lassie From Lancashire?

Or like the American who turned to his wife last week and said: “Jeez, this is absolutely amazing. Do they really do this every year? I’m not going home!”

By any standards, it was a wonderful meeting; Ryan Moore’s unstoppable surge, the sudden arrival of a possible new star in Time Test, Soumillon’s late, late thrust in the Coronation Stakes, the prospect of Gleneagles and Solow meeting at Goodwood, Dettori’s dramatic return to centre-stage, his old ally John Gosden quietly ticking off a bauble here, a trinket there, glittering prizes everywhere.

IMPRESSIVE

Gosden is an impressive figure, a sort of all-seeing paterfamilias, an amiable godfather for the sport as a whole.

Suddenly his is the most powerful yard in Newmarket and it came as something of a relief to be reminded that Sir Michael Stoute is not ready for pipe, pyjamas and Poirot just yet.

Indeed, after his surprisingly easy victory in the Hardwicke, Snow Sky will have to be considered for all the top middle-distance prizes from now on.

Comparisons may be odious but they remain hard to avoid. Has there ever been a better trainer than Aidan O’Brien? To this observer it seems fairly unlikely. He wins everything. He’d even win a politeness competition if they set one up. “Listen, Rishi, listen…..” You could be the most unsung interviewer on earth, hoping by some miracle to make your way in the game, but Aidan would still know your Christian name.

And who else steps a horse up from a mile to two miles in one go after an absence of nine months and wins the Queen’s Vase with it?

“What a trainer he is,” Moore said admiringly at one point. Not bad, given that a compliment from the former champion comes along as often as a fat postman.

So, there was Aloft and Gleneagles and the almost frighteningly speedy Waterloo Bridge, who may well break the course record at Goodwood.

Yet arguably the finest training performance of the week came from Dermot Weld, who somehow coaxed and cajoled the brittle Free Eagle back to his best to resist The Grey Gatsby in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes.

Jamie Spencer all but got there and has never ridden better. Just as well he didn’t retire. Maybe he changed his mind when he realised not a soul in the world believed him anyway.

Who in their right mind would willingly give up the best five days’ racing in the world? Jeez!