The Ontario Matron Stakes is a Canadian Thoroughbred horse race run annually at Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, Ontario. Held during the third week of July, it is open to fillies and mares, age three and older. An ungraded stakes raced over a distance of 11/ miles on Polytrack synthetic dirt, the race currently offers a purse of $150,000 with an addition $50,000 for Ontario bred horses from the Ontario Thoroughbred Improvement Program (T.I.P.).
The Ontario Matron Stakes was first run in 1979. Until 2006 it was known as the Ontario Matron Handicap.
Famous quotes containing the words matron and/or stakes:
“Ye gentle souls, who dream of rural ease,
Whom the smooth stream and smoother sonnet please;
Go! if the peaceful cot your praises share,
Go, look within, and ask if peace be there:
If peace be his—that drooping weary sire,
Of theirs, that offspring round their feeble fire,
Or hers, that matron pale, whose trembling hand
Turns on the wretched hearth th’ expiring brand.”
—George Crabbe (1754–1832)
“Law makes long spokes of the short stakes of men.”
—William Empson (1906–1984)