Country’s oldest horse race won by Sawdon rider
The Kiplingcote’s Derby marks 498 years
A Scarborough rider was crowned three-times winner of England’s oldest horse race after storming to victory on her horse Bob.
Tracey Corrigan, from Sawdon near Scarborough, was out in front throughout the Kiplingcotes Derby which is run over four-and-a-half miles of sometimes treacherous and rough terrain in the Yorkshire Wolds.
The bookies favourite, who has won the race on two other horses in 2014 and 2015, said she had tears in her eyes as she came past the finishing post and a lump in her throat: “I am absolutely delighted and relieved that the horse and I have come back in one piece. I was in the front from the off, I kept looking behind and saw nobody.
“It means so much - I only came to take part; I was going to stay at the back and be a number but I ended up doing quite well.”
In second place was Emma Sanderson, on Trumpstoo, who said: “It was a bit rough in places but my horse was 100% and got me through the worstofit.”
In two years time the race celebrates its 500th anniver- sary.
One of the quirks of the Kiplingcotes Derby is that some of the horses are exracehorses, but run under different names.
Nobody knows until the riders actually appear on the morning of the race who is actually going to take part - making it a tricky job for the race’s only bookie Chris Johnson.
He said: “We have spies looking at the horses – some are obviously exracehorses, but some are in-between, not pit ponies exactly but don’t have the natural ability of racehorses. There’s a lot of guesswork.”