Brushing up on Your Belmont Stakes History

This year’s running of the Belmont Stakes will be the 141st running of the race, the fourth oldest stakes race run in North America.

The only three stakes that date farther back than the Belmont Stakes are the Phoenix Stakes at Keeneland, first run in 1831, The Queens Plate, which was run for the first time in Canada in 1860, and the Travers, which was run for the first time in at Saratoga in 1864.

The Belmont Stakes predates the Kentucky Derby by eight years and the Preakness Stakes by six.

While this year’s running offers up a $1 million purse, the smallest purse in Belmont Stakes history was just $2,500, which was offered for the first running of the race.

The race was won by the filly Ruthless, who took home a check for $1,850.

Contested at 1 ½ miles, the race has produced several winners that won by huge margins. The biggest of course was Secretariat, who captured the Triple Crown by winning the 1973 Belmont Stakes by a record 31 lengths.

Count Fleet, who won the Triple Crown in 1943, won the Belmont by a then record 25 lengths.

With the race at such a marathon distance, you might think a photo finish camera is not needed very often.

However, 28 times in the history of the race the margin of victory was a nose, head, or neck.

The most recent nose that separated the top two finishers occurred in 1998, when Victory Gallop got up in the last jump to out nod Real Quiet, who was seeking to become the 12th Triple Crown winner.

In another recent memorable race, the filly Rags to Riches was a head better than Curlin in 2007.

The average win payoff over the last ten years is $37, a mixture of short priced favorites like Point Given ($4.70) and Afleet Alex ($4.30) and huge upset winners like Sarava ($142.50) and Birdstone ($74.00).

Over the entire history of the race, favorites have done quite well. In the previous 140 runnings of the race, 60 post time favorites have hit the winners circle, nearly 43%.

While the largest Belmont field was 15 in 1983, there were actually five years where the race was literally a match race with just two entrants.

The last year with a two-horse field occurred in 1920, when Man o’ War defeated Donnacona by 20 lengths.

There were five gate to wire winners in Belmont in the 70’s, and just two since.

Swale took the field gate to wire in 1984, and Da’Tara did the same last year in his huge upset.

Mine That Bird is seeking to become just the 12th horse to win the Derby-Belmont double. The last runner to win the Derby, finish second in the Preakness, and return to win the Belmont was Needles in 1956.

The leading jockeys in all time wins in the Belmont Stakes are James McLaughlin and Eddie Arcaro, who have six victories each.

No active jockey has more than two Belmont wins.

Hall of fame jockey Braulio Baeza has the distinction of doing something no other jockey will likely ever achieve. He won the Belmont Stakes over three different racetracks.

He won the 1961 race aboard Sherlock at the old Belmont Park. He won the 1963 race aboard Chateaugay at Aqueduct, which held the race from 1963 to 1967 while Belmont Park was rebuilt.