What is the Mongol Derby?

Officially the longest horse race in the world, according to Guinness World Records, the Mongol Derby is an endurance race staged annually over a 621-mile, or 1,000-kilometre, stretch of the Mongolian Steppe in Inner Mongolia. The Mongol Derby recreates the ancient message delivery system created by Genghis Khan, founder of the Mongol Empire, which was called ‘Yam’. Riders must collect fresh horses – locally supplied, semi-wild, Mongolian horses owned by nomadic tribespeople – from a series of relay, or support, stations set up at 25-mile intervals along the route, and the race lasts ten days.

Serious injuries, including broken bones, and debilitating conditions, such as heat exhaustion or heatstroke, are commonplace, yet year after year dozens of intrepid riders pay thousands of pounds for the privilege of riding in the Mongol Derby. Participants travel from all over the world to ride in the Mongol Derby and, following a compulsory, three-day training course, in the classroom and on horseback, are ready to embark on what is billed as the ‘toughest equestrian event on the planet’.

Of course, the Mongolian Steppe is an immense expanse of grassland, but the route of the Mongolian Derby changes from year to year, such that riders may need to negotiate a variety of terrain. They are restricted to a ‘corridor’, less than two miles wide, to discourage fording rivers but, otherwise, must navigate themselves over, around or through any geographical features they come across using Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment.

Who is Rachael Blackmore?

Nowadays, Rachael Blackmore is stable jockey to Henry De Bromhead and her rise to prominence has gone hand-in-hand with that of the Co. Waterford trainer in recent years. Born in Killenaule, Co. Tipperary in July, 1989, Blackmore was, by her own admission, an ‘extremely average’ amateur jockey, but nevertheless turned professional in March, 2015, because she ‘just needed the practice’.

She rode her first winner as a professional, Most Honourable, trained by John ‘Shark’ Hanlon, in a handicap hurdle at Clonmel in September, 2015. The following season, 2016/17, Blackmore rode 32 winners and became the first female jockey to be crowned Irish Champion Conditional Jockey. Subsequent seasons yielded 34, 90 and 61 winners, respectively and in 2020/21, so far, she has ridden 82 winners and trails only reigning champion Paul Townend, by just four, in the race for the Irish National Hunt jockeys’ title.

Blackmore rode her first winner at the Cheltenham Festival, A Plus Tard, in the Close Brothers Novices’ Handicap Chase in 2019 and her first Grade One winner, Minella Indo, in the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle at the same Festival three days later. She has since added eleven more victories at the highest level, including Honeysuckle in the Close Brothers Mares’ Hurdle at the 2020 Cheltenham Festival.

Which three fillies have won the Kentucky Derby?

The Kentucky Derby has been run at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky since 1875, although the distance was shortened from a mile and a half to a mile and a quarter in 1896. Traditionally staged on the first Saturday in May, ‘The Run for the Roses’, as the race is known, is open to three-year-old colts, gelding and fillies, with the latter receiving a 5lb allowance from their male counterparts. Along with the Preakness Stakes, run at Pimlico in Baltimore, Maryland two weeks later and the Belmont Stakes run at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York three weeks after that, the Kentucky Derby constitutes the American Triple Crown.

Nevertheless, in the better part of a century and a half, just three fillies have won the Kentucky Derby. The first of them was the unbeaten Regret, trained by the legendary James Rowe Sr., in 1915. Unfortunately, owner Harry Payne Whitney neglected to enter her in the Preakness Stakes, so there was no Triple Crown attempt for her. The second was Genuine Risk, trained by LeRoy Jolley, in 1980 and the third was Winning Colors, trained by Darrell Wayne Lukas, in 1988. Both fillies went on to contest both the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes, with Genuine Risk finishing second in both and Winning Colors finishing third in the former, but unplaced in the latter.

How many times has Ryan Moore completed the 1,000 Guineas – Oaks double?

How many times has Ryan Moore completed the 1,000 Guineas – Oaks double? Although he British Champion Jockey in 2006, 2008 and 2009, Ryan Moore has, since 2015, been first choice jockey to Aidan O’Brien at Ballydoyle Stables, Co. Tipperary. Indeed, it was in that capacity that he completed the 1,000 Guineas – Oaks double for the first time in 2016 and did so again in 2020. Moore had won the 1,000 Guineas twice before, on Homecoming Queen, trained by O’Brien, in 2012 and Legatissimo, trained by David Wachman, in 2015, and the Oaks once before, on Snow Fairy, trained by Ed Dunlop

In 2016, Minding – later described by O’Brien as ‘one of the best fillies I have ever trained’ – justified favouritism in the 1,000 Guineas, leading home an O’Brien 1-2-3 in the process. The Galileo filly suffered a facial injury leaving the stalls when narrowly beaten, at long odds-on, in the Irish equivalent, but justified favouritism, again, in the Oaks. In fact, had she been trained by anyone but O’Brien, she may well have contested the Derby, rather than the Oaks.

Four years later, Ryan Moore won both fillies’ Classics in the same season for a second time, aboard another Galileo filly, Love. She won the 1,000 Guineas by 4¼ lengths and the Oaks impressively, by 9 lengths. Like Minding in 2016, Love was named Cartier Three-Year-Old Filly in 2020.

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