Clark Handicap
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The Clark Handicap, a race for thoroughbred horses, is the feature event of the Churchill Downs fall meet. The race is one and one-eighth miles on the dirt for a purse of $500,000 and is open to horses three-years-old and up. Run since 1875, in 2007 it will be in its 133rd year, and is held in honor of the then 26-year-old Colonel M. Lewis Clark who set up the Louisville Jockey Club and founded Churchill Downs.
Begun as a Grade II, the Graded Stakes Committee announced that beginning in 2006 it would be a Grade I event. But in 2007, it's once again a Grade II.
Like the Kentucky Derby and the Kentucky Oaks, the Clark has been run without interruption since its inception.
The great Hall of Famer, Hindoo won this race in 1881. Old Rosebud, also inducted into the Hall of Fame, won it twice.
[edit] Past winners
Winners of the Clark since the beginning of the new century are:
- 2006 - Premium Tap (Kent Desormeaux)
- 2005 - Magna Graduate (John Velazquez)
- 2004 - Saint Liam (Edgar Prado)
- 2003 - Seeking the Gold (Javier Castellano)
- 2002 - Lido Palace (Jorge Chavez)
- 2001 - Ubiquity (Craig Perret)
- 2000 - Surfside (filly) (Pat Day)
[edit] Going Back
- 1999 - Littlebitlively
- 1998 - Silver Charm (Gary Stevens)
- 1988 - Balthazar B. (Kent Desormeaux)