2000 Guineas Start Time
- The 2000 Guineas is the first Classic of the 2021 horse racing season. 2000 Guineas Betting 2021 3.35pm Newmarket, Saturday, May 1 2021; TV: Live on ITV; click best odds in bold; Each-Way Place Terms: 1/5 odds 1,2,3.
- START TIME RACE DISTANCE; 1:50pm: The Betfair Stakes: 9f: 2:20pm: The Betfair Stakes: 5f: 2:55pm: The Betfair Jockey Club Stakes: 12f: 3:35pm: The QIPCO 2000 Guineas: 8f: 4:10pm: The Betfair Handicap Stakes: 6f: 4:45pm: The Betfair Newmarket Stakes: 10f: 5:20pm: The Betfair Handicap Stakes: 8f.
Timeform reveal which horses in the last 50 years ran to the highest rating when winning the 2000 Guineas.
1. Brigadier Gerard (Performance rating 141)
2000 Guineas Stakes - Group 1 (3y) Newmarket - 1mile The Guineas meeting, held at the historic Newmarket course, hosts the first Classics of the Flat season. The 2,000 Guineas is for three-year-old colts and fillies and is run on the famous Rowley Mile course.
One of the all-time greats, Brigadier Gerard achieved the highest performance rating in the 2000 Guineas in the last 50 years when winning by three lengths in 1971. Despite the remarkably small field – only six went to post – Brigadier Gerard was only third in the betting as an incredibly strong line-up also included Mill Reef and My Swallow. The trio had won a combined 16 of their 17 previous starts and scared off plenty of potential rivals.
Despite the small field, the pace of the race was strong and the Dick Hern-trained Brigadier Gerard picked up impressively entering the Dip to draw right away from Mill Reef inside the final furlong.
The first classic of the season is run on Saturday afternoon at 3.35 pm, the 2000 Guineas. A race that has been dominated by Aidan O’Brien in recent years. He won his first in 1998 and has claimed four of the last five renewals. 2000 Guineas Runners. Pinatubo is the only place to start, the winner of all six of his juvenile starts. A string of breathtaking performances had superlatives dripping from the pens of every. The 2000 Guineas is run over the mile. It was first run in 1809 and was won by Wizard. The 2000 Guineas is the first of the classic season flat races held each year. One of five classics, it is traditionally run at the end of April or start of May. The Derby and St Leger form the rest of the Triple Crown.
Mill Reef went on to frank the form in no uncertain terms, stepping up in trip to win the Derby, Eclipse, King George and Arc before the year was out, while Brigadier Gerard proved prolific in the top mile races before stepping up to win the Champion Stakes on his final three-year-old start.
Meeting with defeat only once in his career and retiring at the end of his four-year-old season, Brigadier Gerard’s rating peaked at 144 and has since been bettered by only Frankel.
2. El Gran Senor (136)
Following an unbeaten two-year-old campaign, the Vincent O’Brien-trained El Gran Senor was sent off a strong 15/8 favourite for the 2000 Guineas in 1984 and produced a top-class performance.
Stylishly making progress onto the heels of the leaders two furlongs out, Pat Eddery hit the front entering the final furlong and never needed to get really serious with his mount to stamp his authority, crossing the line with plenty in hand over some high-class rivals. Indeed, Chief Singer, Lear Fan and Rainbow Quest filled the frame behind El Gran Senor and all subsequently went on to win Group 1 contests.
With such a strong-travelling display to win the Guineas, El Gran Senor had a slight question to answer over his stamina as he went up in trip later in the year, but, having narrowly missed out to Secreto in the Derby, he proved himself in clear-cut fashion by beating Rainbow Quest in the Irish Derby before injury curtailed his career and he was retired to stud.
3= Nijinsky (135)
Much like El Gran Senor, Nijinsky completed a perfect juvenile campaign by winning the Dewhurst, establishing himself as the clear favourite for the 2000 Guineas the following year. It was arguably not the strongest of renewal, but Nijinsky scored with plenty in hand under a confident Lester Piggott, leaving spectators in no doubt he was a top-class performer.
Nijinsky went on to cement his status as one the greats with one of the best performances ever seen in the Derby, displaying a tremendous turn of foot to beat Gyr, before a comfortable win in the St Leger secured his place in history as a Triple Crown winner. A busy three-year-old campaign eventually caught up with him, though with more luck in running he may well have added the Arc to his remarkable year, and he was retired to stud following a below-par display in the Champion Stakes. He remains the last horse to have won the Triple Crown.
3= Frankel (135)
It may come as a surprise that Frankel is only joint-third as, in many ways, his performance in the Newmarket showpiece was the most devastating ever seen, striding on from the get-go at a strong pace, barely anything even able to lay a glove on the Galileo colt, the race taken apart by halfway. However, such was the exuberance he displayed, even the six-length margin of victory over Dubawi Gold failed to show Frankel’s full superiority on the day.
Frankel, whose career was expertly charted by Sir Henry Cecil, went from strength to strength, consistently winning his races with performances of 140-plus as a four-year-old, showing himself to be the greatest racehorse of all time with a stunning 11-length victory over Excelebration in the Queen Anne Stakes at Royal Ascot, earning a Timeform rating of 147.
2000 Guineas Start Timeline
5. Dancing Brave (134)
Dancing Brave, like Frankel, also carried the famous Khalid Abdullah silks to 2000 Guineas glory, making his way onto this list courtesy of a three-length win over Green Desert, who himself went on to be a high-class sprinter. On the day at Newmarket there was no great pace and Dancing Brave, ridden by Greville Starkey, produced a real flourish to not only wear Green Desert down but assert in dominant style inside the final furlong.
The way he pulled clear suggested he’d stay further and, after a famously unlucky defeat in the Derby, Dancing Brave went on to record four more wins for trainer Guy Harwood, including the Arc, in which he produced a remarkable late run to get up close home.
English 2000 Guineas
Also read: