He was left behind at the start and was still in last place on the final turn, but then quickened past his opponents to win by one and a half lengths from Slip Stitch.

Royal Palace made his three-year-old debut in the 2000 Guineas at Newmarket, for which he started 100/30 joint-favourite with Bold Lad in a field of eighteen runners.

Ridden by the Australian Racing Hall of Fame jockey George Moore, he challenged for the lead in the final quarter mile and won by a short head from the French-trained colt Taj Dewan.

The victory was reportedly well-received owing to the popularity of Jim Joel, who was winning his first classic since Royal Palace's great-grandam Picture Play won the 1000 Guineas in 1944.

An unusual feature of the build-up to the race was the huge public gamble on the outsider El Mighty, who was backed from odds of 200/1 to 25/1 after a Peterborough shopkeeper claimed to have seen the horse winning in a dream.

[5] Having won the first two legs of the Triple Crown, Royal Palace missed the important summer championship races to be prepared for the St Leger at Doncaster Racecourse.

He returned for the Champion Stakes over ten furlongs at Newmarket in October, but failed to reproduce his best form, finishing third behind Reform and Taj Dewan.

In July, returned to Sandown for an exceptionally strong renewal of the Eclipse Stakes, in which his opponents included Taj Dewan and the 1968 Derby winner Sir Ivor, who started the 4/5 favourite.

[6] Taj Dewan took the lead in the straight, and although Royal Palace produced a strong finish he appeared to have narrowly failed to catch the leader.

In 1991, at The National Stud near Newmarket, Suffolk in England, the twenty-seven-year-old Royal Palace was put down as a result of infirmities from old age.