The Queen made an official visit to Prestbury Park this year for the Gold Cup - and to unveil a bronze bust of her mother, who was a regular visitor to the Cheltenham Festival.  | | The Queen attended the Festival months before her coronation |
Racecourse officials and the Press Association had claimed that her 2003 Gold Cup Day visit was her first as sovereign. They reported that she last attended the Cheltenham Festival in 1951 when she was still Princess Elizabeth. But BBC Gloucestershire breakfast show presenter Vernon Harwood uncovered a previously unrecorded visit while looking through some old newsreel footage from the 1950s. The film clearly proves that the Queen actually last visited Prestbury Park in her coronation year, 1953.  | | Angela Conner's bronze bust of the Queen Mother |
She was accompanied by the Queen Mother, a keen National Hunt fan and owner who attended the Festival almost every year until her death last year. As an owner, the Queen Mother had 445 victories over jumps, putting her second in the all-time list. The Gold Cup winner in 1953 was the nine-year-old, Knock Hard, ridden by Tom Molony. A BBC Radio Gloucestershire listener recalled the Queen's 1953 visit after Vernon Harwood's on-air revelation. She said: "She was with the Duke and Duchess of Beaufort and they watched the race from the water jump on the back of a Land Rover." 
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