The 2,000 Guinea Stakes is first leg of the Triple Crown for colts in England. It is the first of the five
Classics to be run annually. Befitting its standard, the 2,000 Guinea Stakes is a Group 1 horse contest of thoroughbred fillies and colts which have to be three years old.
Course
The 2,000 Guinea Stakes takes place at Newmarket on the Rowley Mile over a distance of one mile. It takes place annually at the end of April of the first Saturday of May.
Winners
Wizard was the first horse to win the first renewal. You don’t have to go very far back in history to get the most successful owner in the history of the 2,000 Guinea Stakes. Sue Magnier owns seven winners of the race to date. They include Entrepreneur who won in 1997, King of Kings in 1998, Rock of Gibraltar in 2002, Footsteps in the sand in 2005, George Washington in 2006, Henry the navigator in 2008 and Camelot in 2012.
Two extraordinary performances stand out visually over the years. The first one is by Tudor Minstrel, a brilliantly fast horse who annihilated his competitors by 8 lengths in 1947, giving a third victory to Gordon Richards, one of the
greatest jockeys.
However, no performance matches that which Frankel displayed in 2011. Other notable horses are Ormonde which won in 1863 and Atlantic which won 1874. Atlantic gave Fred Archer the pioneer of his three victories in the race.
Prize money
Both the 2,000 Guinea Stakes and the sister race, 1000 Guinea Stakes were named according to their original prize funds because a guinea was worth £1.05 or 21 shillings. Starting 2001, both the 2,000 Guineas and the 1,000 Guineas Stakes offer an equal amount for the prize money. Each one of them offered £500,000 in 2018. This however refers to the total purse, so the top three horses receive fractions of that amount.