Newmarket hoping for a golden finale to its 350 celebrations

This afternoon marks the start of the autumn season at Newmarket, with the action back on the Rowley Mile and Classic clues to the fore. Over the next three days there are six Group races and one major handicap, with the Cesarewitch, Dewhurst and Fillies' Mile to come, not to mention five weeks of sales.

The calendar decreed 2016 was always going to a big year in Newmarket as it marks 350 years of racing on the neighbouring heath that hasn't seen a plough since 1666 as Sir Mark Prescott likes to remind visitors – but what a year it has been already.

Even before a '#weare350' leaflet dropped through the post in March, it was evident there were more horses then ever on the Heath to mark the occasion, which led to queues longer than those at the local Tennant's Butchers of a morning and rumblings about a lack of canters on Warren Hill.