The Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes is an American Thoroughbred horse race run annually during the last week of November at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky. A Grade II event, the race is open to two-year-olds willing to race one and one-sixteenth miles on the dirt, and is a Road to the Kentucky Derby race, offering points to the top four horses towards being one of the 18 horses eligible for the race by points in North American races (there are spots available to European and Asian horses which participate in races in their respective continents, but if they decline, those spots go to the next highest in points from the North American events).

Inaugurated in 1920,^[1] the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes was contested at a distance of one mile from its inception through 1979. The race was transferred to the Latonia Race Track in Covington, Kentucky in 1931 but returned to Churchill Downs in 1934.

There was no race run between 1939 and 1945 because of World War II.^[2]

Historical notes

Five horses have won the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes and then returned the next spring to win the Kentucky Derby. The most recent Derby winner was Super Saver (2010). Prior winners were Cannonade (1974), Twenty Grand (1931), Clyde Van Dusen (1929) and Reigh Count (1928).

In 1930, Twenty Grand won the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes in a track record time of 1:36 flat which at the time was the fastest mile ever run by a two-year-old in the United States.^[3]

In 1933, Mata Hari became the first filly to win the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes.^[4]

Records

Speed record: (at current distance of 1+1⁄16 miles)

• 1:42.83 – Super Saver (2009)

Most wins by a jockey

• 4 – Calvin H. Borel (2000, 2008, 2009, 2014)

Most wins by a trainer

• 3 – D. Wayne Lukas (1989, 1991, 1997)

Most wins by an owner

• 4 – John C. Oxley (1994, 2008, 2012, 2015)

Winners

Earlier winners