Epsom Dash, June 2, 2012
admin Epsom Downs Racecourse, in Surrey, is home to two British Classic races, the Derby and the Oaks, both of which are staged over a mile and a half during the two-day Derby Festival on the first weekend in June. As such, Epsom has seen more than its fair share of nerve-shredding drama and history in the making.
Indeed, Classics aside, the five-furlong course at Epsom, which is downhill for all bar the last 100 yards or so, is the fastest in the world. Thus, it should come as no surprise to learn that the race which immediately precedes the Derby, the Epsom ‘Dash’ – a ‘Heritage’ handicap run on that precipitous course – produced a Guinness World Record on June 2, 2012.
On that occasion, 20 runners went to post in a wide-open renewal, in which the bookmakers bet 7/1 the field. The winner, though, was the unconsidered four-year-old Stone Of Folca, trained by John Best and ridden by Luke Morris, who, at 50/1, was jointly the rank outsider of the party. Having his first start since being gelded, the son of Kodiak – a leading source of speed – was ridden to lead with over a furlong to run and driven out to win by a half a length. His winning time, 53.69 seconds, was the fastest recorded in Britain since the advent of electronic timing, although he only beat the previous record, set by Spark Chief, nearly three decades earlier, on August 30, 1983, by just one hundredth of a second.
As a two-year-old, Stone Of Folca had finished second, beaten a neck, in the Group 3 Molecomb Stakes at Goodwood and contested the Group 1 Nunthorpe Stakes at York – albeit finishing last but one of the 12 runners – before winning a lowly, four-runner median auction maiden stakes race at Folkestone at odds of 1/8. Remarkably, his Epsom heroics aside, that would prove to be his only other win in 31 starts.