The Northern Dancer Turf Stakes is a Canadian Thoroughbred horse race held annually at Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, Ontario. A Grade I event with a current purse of $750,000 ($650,000 plus $100,000 from the Breeders Cup Fund), it is held in the third week of July and run at a distance of 1½ miles on Woodbine's E. P. Taylor turf course.
Inaugurated as the Niagara Handicap, it was first raced on dirt at the Fort Erie Racetrack. In 1957 the race was changed to run on turf and was moved to the Woodbine Racetrack in 1985 where for 1986 only, it was run on dirt. The race became part of the Breeders' Cup program and the name was amended to the Niagara Breeders' Cup Handicap. In 2006, the event was renamed to honour Canada's most famous racehorse, Northern Dancer.
Over the years, the race has been run at various distances:
- 11/16 miles : 1953-1956
- 1⅛ miles : 1957-1975
- 1¼ miles : 1990-1994
- 1½ miles : 1976-1989, 1995 to present
Read more about Northern Dancer Turf Stakes: Records, Winners Since 1986, Earlier Winners
Famous quotes containing the words northern, dancer, turf and/or stakes:
“‘What is the world, O soldiers?
It is I,
I, this incessant snow,
This northern sky;”
—Walter De La Mare (1873–1956)
“That God has laid His fingers on the sky,
That from those fingers glittering summer runs
Upon the dancer by the dreamless wave.
Why should those lovers that no lovers miss
Dream, until God burn Nature with a kiss?
The man has found no comfort in the grave.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“One turf shall serve as pillow for us both;
One heart, one bed, two bosoms, and one troth.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Law makes long spokes of the short stakes of men.”
—William Empson (1906–1984)