QIPCO Champion Stakes

QIPCO Champion Stakes Picks

The Champions stakes takes place each year in October as part and parcel of British Champions Day. It is a group 1 horse race that only breds aged 3 years and above is allowed to participate running over a distance of 1 mile and 2 furlongs making it 2,012m long.

History

This event began in 1877 and New Market was the original place where it took place. Springfield was the first to triumph from this but at the end of the century about five winners had triumphed. Race grading was inaugurated in 1971 and with that the Champion Stakes managed to fall in the highest level which is group 1.

Because it was graded as the highest it managed to find a spot in the Breeders’ Cup Challenge in 2009 and 2010. An invitation to take part in the Breeders’ Cup Turf was awarded to the winner. In 2011, the Champions Stake was moved to Ascot. Then it began to take part in the British Champions Day which now it serves as the final of the middle- distance race. It is sponsored by QIPCO and they offered a prize fund of 1,300,000 pounds, and the richest horse became the Champion Stakes but Epsom Derby reclaimed it in 2012.

About Ascot

None of the British horse racing can rival those of ascot even though they claim to. It all started 300 years ago with Queen Anne who spotted the value of the Berkshire land, how healthy it looked while out on her ride a few miles from Windsor Castle. Since then the link to royalty has endured. Even today, the Royal Family together with Queen Elizabeth II does not miss the popular ‘Royal Ascot’ every year.

Meanwhile the Royal Ascot has been awarded as a symbolic key in the social calendar, as the world’s famous breds compete with the world’s most ravishing fashion designs. In 2004-6 Ascot went through a 200,000,000 redevelopment and Betfair sponsors the Queen Elizabeth and King George VI Stakes which took place in July.

Ascot stages 13 of the 35 QIPCO Champions race and also the 5 category finales of the QIPCO British Champions Day. Ascot hosts horses that are right handed and people who enjoy sipping on champagne and scones basically. Over 60,000 bottles of champagne and 40,000 scones are used but lobsters are very low they only consume about 1,500 of them in the period of the five-day Royal Ascot.

Previous Winners

Year	Horse	Jockey	Trainer	Owner
2012	Frankel	Tom Queally	Sir Henry Cecil	Khalid Abdulla
2011	Cirrus Des Aigles	Christophe Soumillon	CorineBarande-Barbe	Jean-Claude-Alain Dupouy
2010	Twice Over	Tom Queally	Henry Cecil	Khalid Abdulla
2009	Twice Over	Tom Queally	Henry Cecil	Khalid Abdulla
2008	New Approach	Kevin Manning	Jim Bolger	Princess Haya of Jordan
2007	Literato	Christophe Lemaire	Jean-Claude Rouget	Hervé Morin
2006	Pride	Christophe Lemaire	Alain de Royer-Dupré	NP Bloodstock
2005	David Junior	Jamie Spencer	Brian Meehan	Roldvale Ltd
2004	Haafhd	Richard Hills	Barry Hills	Hamdan Al Maktoum
2003	Rakti	Philip Robinson	Michael Jarvis	Gary A. Tanaka
2002	Storming Home	Michael Hills	Barry Hills	Maktoum Al Maktoum
2001	Nayef	Richard Hills	Marcus Tregoning	Hamdan Al Maktoum
2000	Kalanisi	Johnny Murtagh	Sir Michael Stoute	HH Aga Khan