British Social Season

De stops lopen in kalendervolgorde. Getoonde data zijn de eerstvolgende editie van elke stop; een gestippelde status betekent dat de organisator nog niet heeft bevestigd.

01Wie het volgt

The British public in large numbers, since almost every fixture on this circuit sells tickets and several are free to watch; the racing, rowing, tennis and sailing communities whose championships these are; the members of the clubs that run them (the Royal Enclosure at Ascot, the Stewards' Enclosure at Henley, the All England Club, the Royal Yacht Squadron); the London corporate hospitality market; and an international crowd that has been coming for the third week of June for as long as there have been international crowds.

02Waarom deze evenementen samenhangen

Tradition, geography and the English summer. Most of these events were fixed in the nineteenth century or earlier and have kept their weeks, so the sequence from Chelsea to Cowes has run in the same order for generations. They are all within two hours of London, which made them a season when the season meant the months the aristocracy spent in town, and they remain one because the dates have never moved. The dress codes, the enclosures and the picnics are what the public associates with the circuit; the sport is what the participants do.

Genummerd in volgorde van de stops; de stippellijn volgt de reeks.

03Het gebruikelijke verloop

Badminton Horse Trials in the first week of May and the Royal Windsor Horse Show in the second. The Chelsea Flower Show in the last week of May; Glyndebourne opens the same week. The Derby at Epsom on the first Saturday of June; Trooping the Colour on a Saturday in mid-June; Royal Ascot from the Tuesday of the third week to the Saturday; the Cartier Queen's Cup final at Guards Polo Club the following Sunday; Queen's Club tennis the same fortnight. Wimbledon's two weeks from the end of June; Henley's five days ending on the first Sunday of July; the Goodwood Festival of Speed in mid-July; the Cowdray Gold Cup final later in the month. The Qatar Goodwood Festival at the turn of July and August, then Cowes Week on the Solent, and the Edinburgh festivals in August as the coda.

04Geografie

London and the counties within two hours: Berkshire (Ascot, Windsor), Surrey (Epsom, Guards at Windsor Great Park), Oxfordshire (Henley), West Sussex (Goodwood, Cowdray), East Sussex (Glyndebourne), Gloucestershire (Badminton), and the Isle of Wight (Cowes). Wimbledon, Chelsea, the Mall and Burlington House are in London itself.

King's Troop, Royal Horse Artillery, Trooping the Colour, 16 June 2012

05Aanbevolen timing

Ascot week, with the Queen's Cup final on the Sunday and Queen's Club tennis in the same days, is the circuit's peak and the block to choose. Wimbledon's first week plus Henley is the second. The last week of July, with Glorious Goodwood and the run to Cowes, is the most relaxed. Ascot's Royal Enclosure requires sponsorship by an existing member and applications open in the winter; general admission is public. Wimbledon's public ballot opens in the autumn; the queue is real and works.

06Belangrijke overlappen

Royal Ascot and Art Basel share a week every year. Chelsea overlaps Cannes' final days and Villa d'Este. Wimbledon's first week overlaps Henley and the couture shows in Paris; its final weekend has coincided with the British Grand Prix. The Festival of Speed has fallen on the Open Championship's weekend. Glorious Goodwood coincides with the opening of the Salzburg and Bayreuth festivals; Cowes Week with the Hublot Polo Gold Cup in Gstaad.

07Waar mensen naartoe gaan daarna

To Scotland, for the Twelfth and the Edinburgh festivals, or to the Mediterranean and the Alpine festivals. The English calendar itself resumes with the Goodwood Revival in September, then Frieze London and the October auctions. The next international fixture after Cowes is Monterey Car Week in the third week of August.