For a monarch who’s spent the past 70 years dressing in bright colours and tall hats under the assumption that she needs to be seen to be believed, it might be a little jarring to imagine her in comfy clothes at Windsor Castle watching the Derby, but according to granddaughter Zara Tindall, that’s exactly how The Queen watched the races.
Speaking to the hosts at the Derby on Saturday afternoon, Zara said about her grandmother, “She will be watching on the TV—she has a few runners today dotted around the country, so she knows exactly what’s going on. She’ll just be sat on the sofa watching the TV. She’ll be in her comfy clothes.”
Zara also provided an update on The Queen, who’d been forced to pull out of Friday’s Service of Thanksgiving due to experiencing ”some discomfort” at Thursday’s Trooping the Colour. When asked, Zara said that The Queen was well, “but obviously she was in London on Thursday. She’s got runners today, so she’ll concentrate on that and be watching the Derby.”
Commenting on the display of past jockeys who’ve ridden for The Queen, Zara said that it was “so nice to see so many faces” and that it was “funny seeing them trying to fit back into the colours again, all the retired ones.
“Obviously, we’d love her to be here. But it’s nice to be here. I’ve never been to Epsom before. It’s exciting. I need to go and explore.”
The Queen had announced on Friday that she would not be able to attend Epsom, and instead sent her noted equestrian expert of a daughter to represent her. Joining Princess Anne was her husband, Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, her son Peter and his new girlfriend Lindsay Wallace and Zara and Mike Tindall.
Though The Queen might’ve been watching in her comfy clothes, Zara and Mike were dressed to the nines and continued their social media trend of sharing snaps to Mike’s official Instagram account of him wearing her hats.
Each day of the Platinum Jubilee weekend, Mike has shared a photo of himself wearing Zara’s hat and inviting the commenters to guess which colour the next day will bring.
