The Stella Artois Auckland Cup is an annual race held by the Auckland Racing Club (ARC). It is an Open Handicap for thoroughbred racehorses competed on the flat turf over 3200 metres (two miles) at Ellerslie Racecourse in Auckland, New Zealand. The race is graded as a Group One (G1) and was first contested in 1874.
For years, the Auckland Cup was the richest horse race in New Zealand. It recalled such names as Beau Vite, Howe, Kindergarten, Beaumaris, Yeman, and Froth, and a consistent runner of the 1880s, Australian champion Nelson, who greeted the judge at the head of the field three times in four years.
The Auckland Cup is currently run for a purse of $1 million making it the equal richest open age race in New Zealand. Since 2006, the race is contested on the Wednesday of Auckland Cup Week at the beginning of March. Previously it had been raced on New Year's Day.
Read more about Auckland Cup: Winners of The Auckland Cup, Previous Winners
Famous quotes containing the word cup:
“In poorer lands
No one touches the water of life.
It has no taste
And though it refreshes absolutely
It is a cup that must also pass
Until everybody
Gets some advantage....”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)