Un De Sceaux winning the Clarence House Chase last year© Photo Healy Racing
The Clarence House Chase will be run at Cheltenham next Saturday following the abandonment of this afternoon's high-profile fixture at Ascot.
The Grade One contest was due to be the main event on an attractive card in Berkshire, with Irish challenger Un De Sceaux set to bid for back-to-back victories.
However, the meeting was called off following an early-morning inspection and the feature event will now be part of a bumper nine-race card on Festival Trials Day at Cheltenham next weekend.
The OLBG.com Mares' Hurdle has also been rescheduled and will be run at Huntingdon on Friday.
A British Horseracing Authority statement read: "Following the cancellation of racing at Ascot, the BHA can confirm that the Clarence House Chase will be run at Cheltenham on January 28.
"In addition, the OLBG Mares' Hurdle will be run at Huntingdon on Friday, January 27.
"Both races will be reopened with entries closing on Tuesday, January 24."
Ascot's clerk of the course Chris Stickels was pessimistic about the chances of today's fixture going ahead and after another night of freezing temperatures, it did not take officials long to draw stumps after staging an official check at 6.30am.
Stickels said: "We've had to abandon, unfortunately.
"It dipped down to minus 3C overnight, which is what was forecast.
"We're only due to get up to plus 2C or 3C today.
"We had similar temperatures on Friday morning and got up to plus 6C in the afternoon and we still weren't raceable, so we've got no chance today."
