Newbury Super Saturday: Race List & Meeting Info

Newbury Super Saturday

Betfair Novices' Hurdle

Class 3, 2m½f

The opening race of Super Saturday is sponsored by Betfair at the time of writing and is limited to novice hurdlers. Run over two miles and sixty-five yards, the race is for horses aged four and over. There are eight hurdles to be jumped, with the prize money sitting at around the £7,000 mark. It takes about four minutes for the horses to complete this Class 3 event when the Going is Good.

Betfair Handicap Hurdle

Class 2, 3m

This Class 2 race is a handicap event, open to horses aged four and over that boasts a rating of between 0 and 145. If the Going is Good then you can expect the horses to take about six minutes to make their way around the course. It’s three miles and fifty-two yards in length, with twelve hurdles that need to be jumped. The prize fund sits at more than £12,000.

Betfair (Game Spirit) Chase

Grade 2, 2m½f

This Grade 2 race is open to horses aged five and over. It’s run over two miles and ninety-two yards, with thirteen fences that must be jumped during the course of that. First run in 1953, it’s named in honour of Game Spirit, which won twenty-one races over six seasons and was owned by the Queen Mother. Though he never won one of the big races, he did finish third in the Gold Cup at Cheltenham in 1974 and second in the Champion Chase two years later.

The race was named in Game Spirit’s honour after he died of a lung haemorrhage in March 1977 after racing at Newbury. The race was given Grade 2 status in 1992, having been run as a Limited handicap before that. It has had a number of sponsored titles over the years, taking on the moniker of the bookmaker Betfair in 2012.

A number of horses have won the race more than once, with the most notable being Viking Flagship, Master Minded and Altior. Horse that do well in this race often go on to be strong chasers, with Viking Flagship being one such example. He won it in 1994 then went on to win the Queen Mother Champion Chase that year and again in 1995, winning the Melling Chase in 1995 and 1996. Other well-known winners have been Flagship Uberalles, Dunkirk and Azertyuiop.

When it comes to jockeys, most of the biggest names in jumping have won this race more than once during their careers. The likes of Tony McCoy, Richard Dunwoody and Barry Geraghty have all stood on the winner's podium at least twice, though none come close to Ruby Walsh’s four wins. Equally both Nicky Henderson and David Nicholson will feel hard done to not to be the race’s premier trainer with four and five wins respectively, beaten out of that honour by Paul Nicholls with seven wins.

Denman Chase

Grade 2, 2m7½f

The other Grade 2 race is the Denman Chase, which was first run as the Aon Chase in 2000. It received Listed status two years later and then was moved to Grade 2 the year after that, holding this since 2003. It has held numerous different sponsored titles over the years, switching to become the Denman Chase after Betfair took over in 2012 and chose to use it to show respect to Denman, who won it in 2008.

In terms of why this race is worth watching, look no further than the Cheltenham Gold Cup. Kauto Star, Denman himself, Coneygree and Native River have all won this and the Festival’s premier race in the same season, so the event is seen as a true trial for it. Native River is, incidentally, the only horse to have won the race on two occasions, managing it in consecutive years in 2017 and 2018.

Newbury has been the victim of poor weather numerous times, leading to the 2009 running being moved to Kempton Park and the 2019 one shifting to Ascot, though the latter move was because of an outbreak of equine flu that year.

Aidan Coleman and Mick Fitzgerald have both won the race twice as jockeys, with Ruby Walsh doing so three times. Yet they all trail behind Richard Johnson, who won it four times between 2004 and 2018. Likewise, Colin Tizzard and Nicky Henderson have both trained two wins, but Paul Nicholls is unquestionably the standout master of the Denman Chase. A Nicholls trained horse has won it no less than nine times!

Betfair Hurdle

Grade 3, 2m½f

The race that many consider to be the feature race of the day is the Grade 3 Betfair Hurdle. Run over two miles and sixty-nine yards, the race features eight hurdles and is open to horses aged four and up. It’s limited to a field of twenty-four runners and is a handicap, meaning that there’s no weight information to give you as the handicapper decides how much each horse should carry in order to make the race as fair as possible.

The Betfair Hurdle was first run in 1963 and, interestingly enough, was actually run at Aintree. Back then it bore the title of the Schweppes Gold Trophy because of sponsorship, with Schweppes continuing sponsorship duties until 1986. Having moved to Newbury in 1964, the race endured some controversy during its more formative years. Ryan Price trained four of the first five winners with Josh Gifford in the jockey’s seat, but the Gifford was suspended for six weeks following the second of those wins.

After 1987 the race took on another long-term sponsor, this time in the form of the totalisator betting company Tote Bookmakers, which later became Totesport. For that reason it was known as the Tote Gold Trophy and then the Totesport Trophy before Betfair took over sponsorship duties in 2012 and retitled it as the Betfair Hurdle.

This is a good race to watch if you want some clues about the possible destination of the Champion Hurdle, which is run during the Cheltenham Festival a month later. Persian War and Make a Stand are good examples of horses to win both races in the same season, doing so in 1968 and 1997 respectively.

Horses that do well here often go on to become decent chasers, such as Deep Sensation, who won it in 1990 then the Queen Mother Champion Chase in 1993, or Zarkandar, who was victorious in this event in 2012 and then won the Elite Hurdle and the International Hurdle later in the same season.

Geos and Rosyth are the only horses to have won the race more than once at the time of writing, though Jamie Moore, Jamie Osborne and Sam Twiston-Davies have all won it twice as jockeys, whilst Mick Fitzgerald and Tony McCoy have won it three times apiece. Josh Gifford remains the standout jockey, though, with four wins at the start of the race’s existence.

All four of Gifford’s wins came on horses trained by Ryan Price, though that’s still not enough to make him the race’s most successful trainer, with that honour falling to Nicky Henderson who has seen his horses cross the finish line first on five occasions to date.

Novices' Limited Handicap Chase

Class 3, 2m7½f

Another race sponsored by Betfair at the time of writing, the Class 3 Limited handicap is for chasers aged five and over. With a little over £8,000 in prize money on offer, the horses must navigate eighteen fences during the two miles, seven furlongs and eighty-six yards of the event if they hope to be in with a chance of winning some.

Betfair Bumper

Listed, 2m½f

The final race worth mentioning is the Winter Bumper, also known for sponsorship reasons as the Best Odds On The Betfair Exchange Bumper. It’s run over two miles and sixty-nine yards and is open to horses aged four to six. In case you don’t know, ‘bumper’ is a term given to National Hunt flat races, so there are no fences to be jumped during the running.

First run in 1996, it was actually promoted to become a Grade 2 offering in 2002 before later shifting back down to being a Listed race. It has had a number of different titles during the years, often seeing a sponsor’s title come before the words ‘Standard Open National Hunt Flat Race’. Betfair took on the name in 2012.

Many consider this race to be a good trial for the Champion Bumper, which is run during the Cheltenham Festival. No horse has yet won both races, though in 1999 Monsignor finished fourth in this before going on to win the Champion Bumper a month later.

As with most bumpers, horses that run in them often go on to become good hurdlers. Iris’s Gift won this race in 2002, for example, and then the likes of the Sefton Novices’ Hurdle and the World Hurdle in the years that followed. Shutthefrontdoor won it in 2012 and then the Irish Grand National in 2014, but it’s Al Ferof that takes the title of most successful horse to win it, doing so in 2010 before winning the November Gold Cup two years later.

It’s another race that many of the biggest names in jockeying have won at some point, including Mick Fitzgerald, Nina Carberry and Ruby Walsh, but the honour of most successful jockey goes to Tony McCoy with three career wins. Likewise both Paul Nicholls and Nigel Twiston-Davies have trained two winners, but it’s Nicky Henderson and Jonjo O’Neill that take the title of best trainers in the event thanks to three wins apiece.