THE BREEDERS’ CUP

The Breeders’ Cup is two days of championship racing at the end of October, fourteen Grade I races on a Friday and a Saturday for some $34 million in purses, run at a track that changes from year to year: Keeneland, in Lexington, Kentucky, on 30 and 31 October 2026, and Belmont Park, on Long Island, in 2027. The Friday is for the two-year-olds, and the Turf and the Classic close the Saturday. It was conceived as the year-end championship of American racing, open to horses from anywhere.

In 1993 the Classic was won by Arcangues at 133.60 to 1, the longest price of any winner in its history.

The Father of the Cup

John R. Gaines, a pet-food heir and a leading owner and breeder, put the idea to the awards luncheon of the Kentucky Derby Festival in 1982. He wanted, he said, to clean up the sport’s image, and in the Breeders’ Cup’s own words he wanted “a year-end culminating championship for horse racing. An event where horses from across the world could meet to settle the age-old question, ’Who’s the best?’” It was met with scepticism and carried through with the support of the trainer John Nerud. Breeders’ Cup Limited was formed that year.

The first was run at Hollywood Park in 1984, in a single day. Wild Again, at 30 to 1, won the Classic by a head after a bumping duel down the stretch; Gate Dancer was placed third after an inquiry, and the favourite, Slew o’ Gold, second. It stayed a one-day meeting until 2006, and has run over two since 2007.

It has been held in the United States every year but 1996, when it went to Woodbine, in Toronto. Santa Anita has held it most often, for the eleventh time in 2023, and Churchill Downs nine times. In 1988 Julie Krone became the first woman to ride in it, and in 2003, on Halfbridled in the Juvenile Fillies, the first to win.

Keeneland first held it in 2015, chosen for Lexington’s place at the centre of North American breeding. That year American Pharoah led the Classic from start to finish and so won the Triple Crown and the Classic in the same year, the Grand Slam.

The Two Days

Fields are limited to fourteen runners, and in some races twelve. The winners of the Challenge races run round the world, under the rule of “Win and You’re In”, qualify automatically; the rest are chosen by points and a panel. The Classic is worth $7 million and was once the richest race in the world. Each winner’s connections receive four trophies, and the horse a garland of flowers over its withers.

Keeneland was built in 1936 on a hundred and forty-seven acres of farmland west of Lexington, once Jack Keene’s, and is a National Historic Landmark. It is a sales house too, as Keeneland Sales.

In 2026 the gates open at half past nine on the Friday and at nine on the Saturday.

At Del Mar in 2025 the Classic was won by Forever Young, from Japan, ridden by Ryusei Sakai for Yoshito Yahagi. In 2026 it returns to Keeneland on Friday 30 and Saturday 31 October, for the fourth time; the Clubhouse is already sold out.

What to Know

It is run on a Friday and Saturday at the end of October or the first days of November. In 2027 it goes to Belmont Park, at Elmont on Long Island, on 29 and 30 October, pending approval of the dates by the New York State Gaming Commission: the first Breeders’ Cup there since 2005 and its fifth, at a Belmont rebuilt for $455 million.

Tickets are sold through SeatGeek: general admission by the track from $85, and the Clubhouse from $212, though the Clubhouse is sold out for 2026. Reserved seats, boxes and dining are sold apart.

Three codes are published. The Clubhouse is business formal: “Tailored suit or sport coat and dress slacks. Dress shirt with collar and necktie”, and “Suit coats are expected to always remain on.” The Paddock Building is business casual, and the rest of the track smart casual. The Breeders’ Cup itself suggests a suit, a bow tie, a pocket square and a fedora. A lounge suit and a tie, and the jacket stays on.

Blue Grass Airport, in Lexington, is the official airport. The Breeders’ Cup holds rooms for 29 October to 1 November at hotels including The Trail Hotel and the Hyatt Regency Lexington, and sells its own packages.

The mistake is to take the jacket off in the Clubhouse, or to wear denim anywhere at the track. Coats stay on in the Clubhouse, and denim is not allowed “regardless of color or type”.

The Court

The Breeders’ Cup is not the Court’s own. A box or a table in the Clubhouse for the Saturday of the Classic is sought on a member’s behalf, and the Court arranges the whole of it: getting there, where to stay in Lexington, and the table afterward. In 2027 it is a short drive from New York.

How one becomes a member is set out under Admission.