Racing Post Trophy

The Racing Post Trophy is a group 1 event that takes place in October of each year at the Doncaster racecourse. It’s a one mile race for two year old horses and is a relatively new race compared to some, first taking place in 1961. Nevertheless, it’s a much anticipated race, in fact one of the top two year old races of the season.

As with many well known races, it’s had numerous sponsors over the years, including The Observer and William Hill, as well as different race titles ‘Observer Gold Cup’, ‘Futurity Stakes’ etc. The Racing Post trophy , as it is now known, is the last Group 1 race of the flat racing season.

One noteable goal of the race is to win both the Racing Post Trophy and the Epsom Derby the following year. The achievement has been coined the ‘Derby Double’ and so far five horses have ‘done the double’ : Reference Point (1986, 1987), High Chaparral (2001, 2002), Motivator (2004, 2005), Authorized (2006, 2007) and Camelot (2011, 2012).

Two absolute legends of racing are to this day still the leading jockey’s of the event, with both Lester Piggott and Pat Eddery, both with 5 wins. Leading trainer is yet another household name, Henry Cecil with 10 wins from 1969 to 1993.

Winner of the 2017 Racing Post Trophy was 13/8 Saxon Warrior, ridden by Ryan Moore and trained by Aidan O’Brien. The winner took 1st prize winnings of £122,210 from a £215,500 prize pot.