Only Epsom Derby winner High-Rise stands in the way of a French hat-trick of three-year-old champions. Following Helissio in 1996 and Peintre Celebre last year, Pascal Bary's French and Irish Derby winner Dream Well is a good thing for the treble on current ratings.

If the hoped-for showdown between them in this year's Arc de Triomphe is to remain on the cards as a genuine test of a pair of aces, High-Rise must demonstrate in the King George V1 and Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes at Ascot on July 25 that he has improved as much as Dream Well. One line to the French colt's improvement is City Honours.

The son of Darshaan almost took the honours at Epsom when beaten only a head by High-Rise, Luca Cumani's High Estate colt, the pair locked in a thrilling power-struggle that Olivier Peslier won and that had racegoers itching for a rematch in the Irish Derby. Cumani waited for the King George and City Honours was left to fight off the French challenger Dream Well at The Curragh.

That he failed could be put down to the effects of his Epsom duel with High-Rise but the manner in which he failed and in which his conqueror won suggested rather that Dream Well had matured like a camembert, leaving well behind the greener version who narrowly defeated compatriot Croco Rouge at Chantilly.

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Dream Well looked the part, a magnificent son of Sadlers Wells out of an Alleged mare. And he played that part to perfection. This time City Honours was beaten four-and-a-half lengths. That's a long, long gap as it stands now between Dream Well and High-Rise, and it's a gap that may become wider if Dream Well makes further improvement. But High-Rise has scope, too. Tremendous scope. The fact that he'd had just four races in his life before Epsom suggests he can only get better. Extension of his unbeaten run in the King George will pull him closer to Dream Well and bring us all closer to an historic climax to the season.

Dream Well was only the third horse to win both the French and Irish Derbys, and High-Rise's Epsom Classic win was the third fastest English Derby ever. The suggestion is that it might not be such an ordinary season after all. The Arc could make it memorable.

And just when I thought we'd seen the race of the year already! It happened at Royal Ascot when the Gold Cup winner of three years ago, Double Trigger, came back from nowhere to almost pull it off again at the age of seven. Only youth in the shape of four-year-old Kayf Tara and superb jockey skills from Frankie Dettori separated the gamest of game horses - by a neck - from a sensational Ladies' Day triumph.

Already at the meeting, Frankie had tasted not merely success but victories with the stamp of greatness when Intikhab won the Queen Anne by a staggering eight lengths and Bint Allayl took the Queen Mary with such majesty that, at this stage, the Cheveley Park looks an easy bonus for her.

Royal Ascot 1998 may be remembered best, however, for the amazing way in which one man captured his moment of celebration in truly regal manner.

Newly-knighted trainer Sir Michael Stoute took one salute (Exclusive's Coronation Stakes), then another (Maridpour's Queen's Vase) and another (Greek Palace's Bessborough) and yet another (Double Classic's King George V Handicap). Stoute could improve a rocking-horse, he's so good.

But then, so is our Henry. A quiet Ascot for Mr Cecil, though his suffering Derby supporters finally had a pay-day from Dr Fong (St James's Palace Stakes). Not until the final day on Friday did Cecil cause a stir before a Wokingham (Selhurstpark Flyer) - Kings Stand (Bolshoi) double turned the spotlight on the red-shirted Northern maestro Jack Berry.

Cecil's genius, that same patience and placing of horses so admirably illustrated throughout the meeting by Stoute, was focused on a colt that could yet turn the Arc de Triomphe party into a threesome.

If anything could steel Stoute's thunder, and if anything can upset Arc calculations about Dream Well and High Rise, Royal Anthem is the name. The Theatrical colt, all seventeen hands of him, is improvement incarnate. To think you could have had 9-2 about him when he won his maiden at Newbury in May! Yet there he was completing his hat-trick within little more than a month with a King Edward V11 Stakes Group 2 success that had us seriously speculating about the Arc and wishing Henry could have had him ready for the Derby!

As it was, with Capri and Dr Fong both trial failures, Cecil had to rely on Sadian at Epsom. And, in Sadian, lies a line to the progress of High-Rise.

Although Epsom had dried to good, fast ground, without the cut that Sadian needed, he surely had a better chance than some on the strength of his neck second to High-Rise in the Lingfield trial. But pundits and punters alike didn't rate that trial and High-Rise started 20-1 with Sadian out to 25-1.

Though she was only the sixth filly to attempt the Derby since 1916, Cape Verdi was favourite. In fact, the market suggested that only four runners had any real chance. It was 12-1 bar.

Could any punter swear, hand on wallet, that he guessed that none of this fab four would finish in the frame? Or that, despite the demise of these favourites, who had flip-flopped over the weeks before the race, the Derby would be run in near-record time?

Greek Dance (5-1) did best of the quartet in fifth place. In the absence of a certain guide to form, many pundits and punters alike latched on to the Glasgow Stakes, a Class B conditions race which might have remained a simple dessert on the day after York's main dish of the May meeting, the Dante Stakes, had not Henry Cecil's Commander in Chief won it on the way to Epsom glory in 1994.

Surely, said the form swats, Greek Dance was a similar late-developing type with, in Michael Stoute (not yet knighted) the trainer to match Henry in maturing a horse with care and flair. Henry ran Capri in the York race, again entertaining hopes that the Glasgow Stakes would throw up a potential Epsom hero for him, but he quickly knew his fate as Greek Dance took over from Capri inside the last quarter mile to win by six lengths.

I had already torn up my Derby voucher about Capri, since that other Cecil pretender Dr Fong had outpointed Capri on the gallops on Newmarket heath. So I argued that Greek Dance had only done to Capri on the racecourse what Dr Fong had done at home.

To be fair, I thought Greek Dance was unlucky at Epsom, not in the race but in that he appeared out of sorts, sweating up and edgy. As they entered the stalls, I had the feeling this was the right race on the wrong day for him. In the event, though beaten only about six lengths, Greek Dance finished lame and has not been seen since. I think I had read the signs right just before the off, but that still left 14 runners to choose from!

Second Empire (9-2) came in next of the front four in the betting, a disappointing eighth after a late decision to run him and consequent hype that had him favourite approaching the day but second favourite on big-race afternoon following the plunge on Cape Verdi.

The two-year-old Irish champion had been brought back after injury by Aidan O'Brien, namesake and emulator of the great Vincent, to run a close third in the Irish 2,000 Guineas behind Desert Prince and Fa-Eq but had been handled so tenderly in that return race by jockey Christy Roche that the English might have been baying for a blood-letting by the stewards had the coup come off at Epsom.

Ballydoyle must have known that Christy had been thinking of the Derby and not of the Guineas, and confirmation of their real intentions came when Michael Kinane, for me the best big-race rider since Lester Piggott, was jockeyed up for Second Empire at Epsom in preference to English 2,000 Guineas winner King Of Kings (Pat Eddery) and the Dante Stakes scorer Saratoga Springs (W Ryan). O'Brien had three aces but Kinane's booking seemed the trump card.

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Saratoga Springs had already run in a Derby - the French one - the previous Sunday, almost unheard of but, his fans argued, not unexpected for a horse so lazy at home. However, when blinkers were declared for Saratoga, I guessed that something more than laziness had emerged in the horse's make-up and I knew that another precious ante-post voucher was as good as in the bin.

Saratoga Springs finished tenth. King Of Kings, who was never going to stay the trip, was plum last (another to finish lame). So Second Empire came out best of the O'Brien raiders, who had all been forced to reroute from Shannon Airport and had arrived late. Aidan must have wished they'd stayed at home.

And I have to confess that, even if I'd known the fate of them all, I still wouldn't have backed the winner. With King Of Kings, Cape Verdi completed the quartet of favourites. I certainly wouldn't have backed her. Readers of this column will know that I even had reservations about her ability to win the Oaks. Although she probably didn't stay, I don't have any what-did-I-tell-you feelings that I was vindicated about the Derby because I don't like to see a good filly's talents wasted just because her owner can afford to take fantastic chances.

Whatever happens to her now, punters who talk through their pockets will remember her if only because, with her Classic success at Newmarket, she was the only winning favourite in the nine Group One races from 1,000 Guineas to Ascot Gold Cup inclusive. It's been that sort of year.

My immediate feelings after the Derby were for Saratoga Springs; they were those familiar "if only" feelings that most punters have. For what finished second and third in the Derby but the very same colts that Saratoga beat into second and third in the Dante! On the form of that race, Saratoga Springs was the Derby winner from City Honours and Border Arrow but on the big day he wasn't even the same horse.

Aidan O'Brien's Epsom had started so well. Shahtoush put her poor Irish 1,000 Guineas run behind her and won the Oaks at 12-1. It had looked as though Bahr and Midnight Line would run a replay of their Musidora one-two as Bahr, travelling so, so sweetly, snapped at Midnight Line's heels in the straight and wore her down below the distance.

It was only then that Michael Kinane and Shahtoush pounced from way, way back - they were last until Tattenham Hill - coming with a late flourish that made it all look so easy. Midnight Line was beaten threequarters and six in third. Kinane, Peslier, Dettori... Dream Well, High-Rise, Royal Anthem... plus "a dozen" top two-year-olds promised by Robert Sangster (that's what he said when interviewed at Chester in May)... what a menu for the second half of the season!

Final line to form: Sunshine Street, the 150-1 outsider who led them a merry dance in the English Derby and hung on to finish fourth (three lengths behind High-Rise) was last but one, beaten out of sight, by Dream Well at The Curragh, admittedly on easier ground.

Until we have evidence to the contrary, that has to go down as another indication of how tough it will be for High-Rise to overtake Dream Well and reach the very top of the ladder.

TERRY CLARK, a former Fleet Street racing editor for many years, now works as a freelance. He has also been involved in racing promotions and for a long time was closely associated with the Grand National which his paper sponsored. Terry, who has helped organise charity racedays on the Flat (Ascot) and over jumps (Wincanton), has just been commissioned to write a book about betting. He was the first to introduce ante-post and morning odds comparison in English newspapers, his first column recommending a 66-1 winner.

You can reach Terry at: