Mill Reef was an American-bred, British-trained Thoroughbred racehorse and sire. In a three-year career from 1970 to 1972, he won twelve of fourteen races and finished second in the other two. The horse was an outstanding two-year-old in 1970 but proved even better at three, winning the Epsom Derby, the Eclipse Stakes, the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe. He won both his starts as a four-year-old before his racing career was ended by injury. Mill Reef is considered one of the greatest horses to run in Europe since WWII.
Kingsclere is a large village and civil parish in Hampshire, England.
Clare Victoria Balding is an English broadcast journalist and author. She currently presents for BBC Sport, Channel 4 and BT Sport and formerly presented the religious programme Good Morning Sunday on BBC Radio 2. Balding was appointed as the 30th president of the Rugby Football League, serving a two-year term until December 2022.
William Richard Hern was an English Thoroughbred racehorse trainer and winner of sixteen British Classic Races between 1962 and 1995, and was Champion Trainer on four occasions.
Martin Dwyer is an English Epsom Derby winning flat racing jockey having won the 2006 Vodafone Derby upon Sir Percy. This was his second classic success after winning The Oaks aboard Casual Look in 2003. Dwyer is married to Claire, daughter of horse racing trainer Willie Muir;
Casual Look was the winning racehorse in The Oaks in 2003. Owned and bred by William S. Farish III, she was out of the mare Style Setter, a daughter of Manila, the 1986 Breeders' Cup Turf winner and that year's American Champion Male Turf Horse. Her sire was Red Ransom whose career ended after just three races due to a tendon injury. Described by author Ken McLean in his 2006 book Designing Speed in the Racehorse as "a sensationally fast juvenile," Red Ransom was owned by Paul Mellon.
Rokeby Stables was an American thoroughbred racehorse breeding farm in Upperville, Virginia, involved with both steeplechase and flat racing. The operation was established in the late 1940s by Paul Mellon (1907–1999) who won the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Breeder in 1971 and again in 1986. Under Mellon the stable had more than 1,000 stakes race winners with total earnings in excess of US$30 million.
Ian Balding is a retired British horse trainer. He is the son of the polo player and racehorse trainer Gerald Matthews Balding and the younger brother of trainer Toby Balding. Ian Balding was born in the US, but his family returned to the UK in 1945. He was educated at Marlborough College and Millfield school in Somerset. He went up to Christ's College, Cambridge, in 1959 to read Rural Estate Management, where he played Rugby for the university team, gaining his Blue in 1961 at full back. He started training in 1964. Kingsclere became his home at the age of 26 and it is here that earned his reputation as an internationally respected trainer.
Sir Michael Sobell was a British businessman, a major philanthropist, and a prominent owner/breeder of thoroughbred racehorses.
Dermot K. Weld, a former jockey is one of Ireland's most successful racehorse trainers. He holds the record for the most winners trained in Ireland.
Patrick Joseph Smullen, was an Irish jockey who won the Irish flat racing Champion Jockey title nine times. In a career running from 1992 to 2018 he rode 1,845 winners in Ireland and 47 in Britain. Amongst his biggest successes were riding Harzand to victories in the Epsom Derby and Irish Derby in 2016. He was stable jockey to Dermot Weld from 1999 until 2018.
William Buick is a Norwegian-British flat jockey. He shared the champion apprentice jockey title in 2008 with David Probert and won the Lester Award for Apprentice Jockey of the Year in 2007 and 2008. From 2010 to 2014 he was stable jockey to John Gosden. In 2015 he signed with Godolphin. Buick won his first Group1 race in Canada in 2010 and since then has won Group 1 races in England, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the United Arab Emirates and the United States. He has won four British Classic Races: the St Leger in 2010, 2011 and 2021 and the Derby in 2018.
James Anthony "Seamie" Heffernan is an Irish flat racing jockey who rides mainly for horse racing trainer Aidan O'Brien. From a family with no racing connections Heffernan was introduced to the sport when he took a summer holiday job with the National Hunt trainer Arthur Moore. He began his racing career as an apprentice jockey for P J Finn and rode his first winner on 10 August 1988 at the age of sixteen. When Finn retired he moved to the yard of Jim Bolger and shared the Irish champion apprentices title in 1994. He was runner-up in the same competition in 1995 and moved to Aidan O'Brien's Ballydoyle stable in 1996 where he was second jockey after Christy Roche.
Priscilla Victoria Hastings was a British racehorse owner and trainer. She was one of the first three women to be elected as a member of the Jockey Club in December 1977, alongside her half-sister Ruth Wood, Countess of Halifax and Helen Johnson Houghton.
Ernest Johnson is an Epsom Derby winning British flat racing jockey.
Phoenix Reach is an Irish-bred, British-trained Thoroughbred racehorse. Although he never won above Group Three level in Britain he was a highly successful international campaigner, competing in seven different countries and winning major races in Canada, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates. As a juvenile in 2002 he finished second on his only start before being sidelined by injury for more than a year. On his return as a three-year-old he won the Gordon Stakes and finished third in the St Leger before winning the Canadian International Stakes. In the following year he was slow to find his best form but thrived when sent to race in East Asia and won the Hong Kong Vase in December. He began his fourth season by winning the Dubai Sheema Classic and finished second in the Singapore Airlines International Cup, but the rest of his career was disrupted by illness and injury. He retired to stud at the end of 2006 and has had modest success as a sire of winners.
Elm Park is a British Thoroughbred racehorse. As a two-year-old he became regarded as a leading contender for the 2015 British Classic Races after wins in the Royal Lodge Stakes and the Racing Post Trophy. In 2015 he finished third to Golden Horn and Jack Hobbs in the Dante Stakes but finished unplaced in The Derby. He later won the listed Fortune Stakes.
Oisin Murphy is an Irish jockey based in the United Kingdom who competes in flat racing. He has won a British Classic and a number of Group 1 races. He was British Champion Jockey in 2019, 2020 and 2021.
Kameko is an American-bred, British-trained Thoroughbred racehorse. As a two-year-old in 2019 he won his first race and then ran second in both the Solario Stakes and the Royal Lodge Stakes before winning the Vertem Futurity Trophy. On his first appearance as a three-year-old he won the 2000 Guineas in record time. He went on to win the Joel Stakes and finished fourth in both the Sussex Stakes and the International Stakes before being retired to stud at the end of the year.
Robert Hornby is a British jockey who competes in flat racing as a freelance, achieving notable victories for trainers Andrew Balding and Ralph Beckett.
Great Britain
Canada
