Group 1 Inflation

[Bustino74]

Thought it might be interesting to look at the number of races that are now Group 1 that used to be ranked more lowly. As many people know the actual naming of Group races began in 1971 and as far as I can see there were 17 Group 1s that year. A further Group 1 was added as a new race in 1972 (the Benson and Hedges Gold Cup, that is now the International Stakes).
Here are the developments (date race was raised to Gp 1):-

1978: July Cup (6f)
1987: Queen Elizabeth II Stakes (8f)
1988: St James Palace Stakes (8f), Coronation Stakes (8f), Sprint Cup (6f)
1990: Fillies Mile (8f)
1995: Lockinge Stakes (8f)
1999: Nassau Stakes (10f)
2000: Prince of Wales Stakes (10f)
2002: Diamond Jubilee Stakes (6f)
2003: Queen Anne Stakes (8f)
2004: Falmouth Stakes (8f), Sun Chariot Stakes (8f)
2013: Champion Fillies and Mares Stakes (12f)

14 in all but I have a query on the Yorkshire Oaks as I believe it was only raised to Group 1 in 1991 when it was opened to older horses, but I am not certain. I also was surprised to see that the King Stand Stakes was still a Group 1 as I thought it had swapped with the Diamond Jubilee.

I don't know what people think about this, or if they think about it at all!! If nearly 100% more Group 1s are run in the UK it would be ludicrous to think there are 100% more Group 1 horses than there were then. Obviously some of the races should always have been Group 1s. For example it is hard to argue with the promotion of the July Cup or the St James Palace Stakes as they were generally contested by the best around before their elevation. It is interesting that more than half of the promotions were 8f races. Two of those promotions I find hard to take and they are the Lockinge and the Sun Chariot. They rarely look Group 1 to my eyes.

I just have two questions, why are there more Group 1 races when horses generally run less times in a season than they did 30-40 years ago? And has the inflation in Group 1s actually taken away from International aspect of racing?

I was prompted to write this after reading Bostonbob's comment on the Arc, which was a very enlightening one. Couldn't they internationally get together to have certain races that are seen as the pinnacle of the year or indeed the pinnacle of that time of the year. In the '70s for example the Prix du Moulin was seen very much as the Mile championship race in the Autumn, and the QEII was very much second best. This year the QEII will be the European Championship to the detriment of the Moulin but the Moulin is still a Gp1.

 

[Sir Barney Chuckles]

Didn’t ‘The King’s Stand’ get upgraded to Group 1 a few years back??? I seem to recall being at Royal Ascot and there being much razzmatazz about its new status.

Looking at the above list the final 6 (7 if indeed the Kings Stand did get upgraded) have either been promoted to enhance Royal Ascot’s appeal or ‘fillies only’ heats to encourage owner/breeders to keep older fillies in training beyond the age of 3 (Ireland’s ‘Matron Stakes’ is another example of this).

I remember reading a year or so ago that Goodwood were aggressively trying to get the ‘Lennox Stakes’ a Group 1 moniker (no current top level race in this country over that distance of 7 furlongs) whilst after this years Royal meeting Ascot were saying they were very keen to promote both the ‘Coventry’ and ‘Hardwicke’ from their current Group 2 status. Could they be the next races to go Group 1?!?

 

[Bustino74]

Originally the Kings Stand Stakes was the big sprint at Royal Ascot so Group 1 and the Cork and Orerry Stakes over 6f was a Group 3 event. Then in Golden Jubilee year they created the GB stakes from the C+O and it was a Group 1 all of a sudden. Then I thought the Kings Stand was downgraded to Group 2. Maybe it was upgraded again, or maybe I imagined it was downgraded.

I'm sure it's good to keep fillies in training as 4yos but if they are good they can go for the established races as Park Top or Aunt Edith did. It's fine having Group 2s for these older fillies, but why shouldn't they take on the colts?

I can't see that the Coventry can be a Group 1, the Hardwicke is different. But with all this inflation don't you get devaluation?

 

[Sir Barney Chuckles]

But with all this inflation don't you get devaluation?

Most definitely.

Personally, I actually think Ascot has a very strong case with the Coventry as just look at the roll of honour in recent years alone – they include Henrythenavigator, Art Connoisseur, Canford Cliffs, Power and Dawn Approach. 5 out of the last 7 winners have gone onto win a Group 1 and it could be argued that 3 of these were ‘exceptional’. Of the other 2 Strong Suit was a regular Group 2 winner and this years winner War Command has time on his side to join the Group 1 brigade.

 

[Bustino74]

Point taken, and it's good to see eventual 3yo Group 1 horses winning it. But isn't it a bit early in a horse's career to have a race it runs in adorned with Group 1 status? If you take your logic ad absurdum as Aiden wins it now and again and always starts his Coventry horse in a small race somewhere in Ireland maybe that race should get Group 2 or 3.

No I think the Group 1 target for 6f horses should be the Middle Park and if the winner of the Coventry is suited to a furlong further then the Dewhurst is the pinnacle. Dropping in Group 1 tags because good horses win them should not be the rationale, even if it's been done before it seems.

 

[OddDog]

It's all driven by the money men at the end of the day. Same with most sports - "what can I do to generate even more revenue from the sport". Look at the Champions League - used to be the European Cup with 32 clubs starting (the Champions of each nation) and going through to the final on a knockout basis. Now what do we have? 3 qualifying rounds, a play-off round, a group stage and four knockout rounds. At least they've got rid of the second group stage, but what it ultimately means is you have sacrificed quality for quantity until you get to the last 16.

Coming back to the pattern system in horse racing - the owners and breeders are happy, because it's alot easier to get their horse some "black type" these days. Bookies are happy as there are more "big" races where occaisional punters are more likely to have a bet. Racecourses are happy because it helps them get people through the gate at potentially higher admission prices. The only ones that suffer are the customers (us) as we are offered a diluted product which often results in races which are G1 in name only.

I'm not picking on Al Kazeem here in particular - I have no real feelings towards the horse one way or the other - but look at the five G1 races he has contested this season. Very poor contests with beasts who are G2 at best or (in the case of Toronado) didn't stay. Horses like Al Kazeem, Declaration of War, Mukhadram and Trading Leather just aren't true G1 horses. Sir Michael Stoute smelled the gravy and sent a handicapper (Hillstar) up against them at York .

 

[Bluesky9]

Some great points made on this thread. I think Sir Barneys is a very good one about looking down the roll of honour as this tells you most definitively if this race is genuinely a group one race, I understand that raising the status of race will attract better horses but there are some interesting things to note when looking down a roll of honour.

As Barney points out it's hard not to make a case for the Coventry, that so many of the recent winners went on to become very serious horses of group one calibre such as Henrythenavigator, Canford Cliffs and Dawn Approach proves this, it's a very hard race to win and does encourage trainers to bring on their horses earlier possibly as there must be a temptation to wait longer with a good two year old before asking for serious effort (perhaps rightly). It is hard to make a point so easily for the Falmouth or Sun Chariot and the Hardwicke becoming a group one does not really hold up in my view.

I think care must be taken that we do not end up like Boxing where by more world titles were created only to diminish the term somewhat. I like the idea offered of a champions race at each distance in Europe where by the prize money would be elevated to eclipse average group ones in the hope of attracting the champions from each country. This is obviously what the Arc already is but if we can add a 6f, 8f and 10f race and somehow give them a status above even group 1 it would hopefully take on the prestige that the Arc has and encourage the clashing of the very best where as at the moment its possible for a good horse to become a group one winner without truly measuring itself against the best due to the quantity of races available. If I were to shout out a few group one winners noted from browsing the roll of honour I really feel some of us would be highly surprised but with a few exceptions we are rarely surprised looking down the roll call of Arc winners for they are champions.

 

[Bustino74]

Two good posts, and I agree with much of what has been said and the analogy to boxing is a good one. No problem with Super Group 1s, but how that is put together is difficult as the Breeder's Cup has partly skewed things.
Just on the Coventry I just feel that most of the field is made up of the earliest 2yos from a whole number of trainers and that the field itself sometimes doesn't look that good at the end of the year (and I know there are exceptions). On second thoughts you are right on the Hardwicke.

One aspect of there being more than enough Group 1s is that once a horse wins a Group 1 he is almost certain not asked to run again in a Group 2. If he or she does they have to give weight to non-winners of Group 1s. This didn't use to be the case with the original pattern. There were plenty of examples of animals having to take on horses they'd already beaten under more difficult circumstances. Not a big thing but a slight loss to competition. It has almost become that it is beneath a horse to have to give weight to another these days.

 

[Tamerlo]

Personally I don't think the Coventry Stakes nor the Hardwicke Stakes should be promoted to Group One status.
Historically the Coventry has a very poor record for producing Classic winners- top trainers traditionally preferred to target the later races like the Dewhurst or the Middle Park. One or two recent exceptions doesn't justify a change, in my opinion. Overall, you could argue it's closer to Group Three than Group One, certainly on results.
As far as the Hardwicke is concerned, it has progressively deteriorated in quality. Look at some of the winners in the sixties and seventies- and then look at them after then. Very mediocre and certainly very few Group One contenders.
I certainly think there are too many Group One races and, without doubt, the Lockinge should be downgraded.
Also, the problem is aggravated by the deterioration in quality of our Group One horses. Apart from a few exceptions, there aren't many horses in the last ten years or so which would be rated in the top 150 of all time.
What we have are small Group One fields monopolised by a few trainers - and contested by horses that are "kept in cotton wool."
Personally i should reduce the Group Ones by more than half in order to accord enhanced status to those that really merit the rating.

 

[QuarterMoonII]

I have a query on the Yorkshire Oaks as I believe it was only raised to Group 1 in 1991 when it was opened to older horses, but I am not certain.

I have checked through my collection of old racecards and the Yorkshire Oaks was definitely a Group 1 race back in 1987 when it was run as the race after the International Stakes on Tuesday; both races sponsored by Matchmaker Group.

Two of those promotions I find hard to take and they are the Lockinge and the Sun Chariot. They rarely look Group 1 to my eyes.

In recent years the Lockinge has attracted a few decent horses, like that one that Sir Henry Cecil trained. I remember the 1989 Lockinge, when it was a Group 2 race, and Guy Harwood’s Warning was beaten under a Group 1 penalty by Most Welcome. One of my favourite ever photos is a portrait I took of Warning that day and the horse actually looks sad. Maybe they do know when they have lost.

why are there more Group 1 races when horses generally run less times in a season than they did 30-40 years ago?

Horses running fewer races in their season/career is a fairly recent training phenomenon. Now that there are more Group 1 races that presents more opportunities for more horses to win one, which particularly appeals to the breeding side of the industry.

In the '70s for example the Prix du Moulin was seen very much as the Mile championship race in the Autumn, and the QEII was very much second best. This year the QEII will be the European Championship to the detriment of the Moulin but the Moulin is still a Gp1.

The Queen Elizabeth II Stakes only became a Group 1 when they started putting together the weekend at Ascot with the Royal Lodge and the Fillies’ Mile in September. When Champions’ Day was created at Ascot, the QEII moved back a month and the French moved the Prix Du Moulin onto the Arc Trails Day card. I think that the Moulin is too close to the Prix Jacques Le Marois now.

after this years Royal meeting Ascot were saying they were very keen to promote both the ‘Coventry’ and ‘Hardwicke’ from their current Group 2 status. Could they be the next races to go Group 1?!?

Having too many early season Group 1 races could prove particularly troublesome, especially for the two year olds. If a horse picks up a Group 1 in June, it is going to find it very hard to race in much of the two year old calendar because it will be penalised.

Dropping in Group 1 tags because good horses win them should not be the rationale, even if it's been done before it seems.

The rule is pretty much put up the prize money and point out how the race has been won by good horses over recent years. If one listed the Group 1 races run in Germany and Italy, up until the last few years they have been farmed by British/Irish Group 2/3 horses because the money was good and the home team not so good.

The only ones that suffer are the customers (us) as we are offered a diluted product which often results in races which are G1 in name only.

It not only creates races that are Group 1 in name only but it allows the good horses to avoid racing against each other, which devalues the sport and causes people to lose interest.

 

[Bustino74]

The Queen Elizabeth II Stakes only became a Group 1 when they started putting together the weekend at Ascot with the Royal Lodge and the Fillies’ Mile in September. When Champions’ Day was created at Ascot, the QEII moved back a month and the French moved the Prix Du Moulin onto the Arc Trails Day card. I think that the Moulin is too close to the Prix Jacques Le Marois now.

I was only making the point that there was a reasonably defined mile champion race and now it seems to have changed, yet they are both still Group 1s.
I remember both the first Fillies Mile (or Green Shield (Stamp) stakes, as it was then, won by the Queen's Escorial from Dick Hern's Gaily) and it was run on the Friday of the traditional late September Ascot Meeting.
I also remember the Brent Walker British Festival of Racing that took place for the first time in 1990 on the Saturday of that meeting with the Fillies Mile on the card and upgraded to Group 1. But the QEII had always been on the Saturday and had been a Group 1 since '87. I don't remember if the move to Saturday of the Fillies Mile coincided with its upgrade or not. I would wager it happened earlier though.

The best point you make (amongst many others) is that it devalues the sport and CAUSES PEOPLE TO LOSE INTEREST.

 

[Bustino74]

Interesting comment from Tony Morris.

For anyone in these islands anxious to learn about the racing programme in France, as I was in the mid-1960s, the annual Abrégé des Courses Plates provided a splendid guide. Five illuminating pages in the volume covering the 1965 season identified for me the names of the biggest races (the grandes epreuves), and they were neatly presented in chronological order under age groups. The courses where they were staged and the distances over which they were run were also included, and the most important events, designated classiques, were readily recognised by the simple use of capital letters.
Full marks to the French, I thought. Somebody there had done a bit of serious planning, there was a logical structure to their campaign, and as well as its minor role in educating foreigners such as me as to what went on there it served a more significant purpose in indicating for the professionals in the game how the career of an aspiring high-class racehorse should be managed.
There were 21 races referred to as classiques, the Robert Papin, the Morny and the Grand Criterium for two-year-olds only, the Forêt for two-year-olds and up, the Greffulhe, the Daru, the Noailles, the Poulains, the Pouliches, the Hocquart, the Lupin, the Saint-Alary, the Jockey-Club, the Diane, the Grand Prix de Paris, the Royal Oak and the Vermeille for three-year-olds only, the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud and Arc de Triomphe for three-year-olds and up, and the Ganay and Cadran for four-year-olds and up. Significantly, none was a handicap.
The essential message conveyed by that list was: here is how we cut the prestige cake in French racing, so if you want a slice of it, earning a real reputation for your horse, and the appropriate financial rewards, these are your targets. How ordered, how sensible, how obviously founded in logic it was.
I was still pretty much a novice in the game then, but I could readily recognise that what we had in England was anything but a well-defined programme of major races. At York in August 1965, the Yorkshire Oaks was worth £4,465 to the winner, the Nunthorpe £3,741, the Great Voltigeur £4,524, the Gimcrack £6,809, and the Ebor Handicap £10,419. The big betting race of the meeting provided the richest reward, and it was a contest in which the previous year’s Oaks heroine, Homeward Bound, carried top weight of 9st 7lb and was trying to concede as much as 35lb to some of her 24 rivals. Sent off at 33-1, she finished a never-dangerous eighth and victory went to one of the joint-favourites, Twelfth Man, another four-year-old, shouldering 7st 5lb.

Racehorses of 1965 awarded a rating of 133 to Gimcrack winner Young Emperor, 125 to Voltigeur winner Ragazzo, 122 to Nunthorpe winner Polyfoto, 113 to Yorkshire Oaks winner Mabel, and 103 to Twelfth Man. Those marks would not have surprised any racing professional with an understanding of what constituted class in the thoroughbred and which races had the potential to influence the breed, but for the man in the street the least gifted of the quintet, just a useful gelding, appeared to be the star turn. He needed educating.
Exactly what it was that provoked the powers-that-were in England to embark on that process of education I don’t know, but I have always liked to think it was the French model, which set such a shining example of the way it should be done. By 1969 England had a system of classification for its major races, a Pattern for Racing, as it was styled in the report of a committee chaired by the Duke of Norfolk. It came in quietly, with absolutely no fanfare, and few people were aware of its existence until it became part of an integrated scheme involving other European countries in 1971.
It made something of a stuttering start. The scheme, as announced, included major races from England, France, Ireland and Italy, but by publication date for the first annual setting out the conditions of entry for events in the new European Pattern, the Italians still had not got their act together. The dates of the scheduled races in Italy appeared in that slim volume, but there were no race conditions, an omission that could hardly have encouraged entries from other countries.
Indeed, such was the confusion and failure of communication that the fifth Pattern race of 1971 in Italy, the Group 3 Corsa dell’ Arno at Florence, was run under handicap conditions. It remains the sole anomaly in that respect among the 14,174 European Pattern races contested in the first 43 years of the scheme.
In the year of its inception the European Pattern consisted of 243 races: 50 Group 1, 60 Group 2 and 133 Group 3. There were 161 individual winners, among them Mill Reef and Brigadier Gerard, responsible for 11 victories between them. We always knew that the scheme would evolve, and additions were to be expected. Germany, not one of the original participants because many of its races were then closed to foreign horses, was cleared to join in 1973, and for many years just five nations were included in the scheme.
Further growth took place and other countries became involved, but there was a long period of stability with the number of races never exceeding 329 between 1986 and 2001. When the tally finally exceeded that figure, reaching 331 in 2002, that might have seemed no big deal, but closer examination revealed something that had clearly gone wrong. While the races in Group 3 numbered 172, around the level constant since the late 1970s, there were now 80 in Group 2, only one more than those in the elite Group 1 category.
There clearly needed to be an adjustment to restore a sensible differential between the top two Groups, but the way that was achieved in 2003 was far from satisfactory. The overall Pattern was extended by 16 races, with one addition in Group 1, 11 in Group 2 and four in Group 3. Unsurprisingly, the prestige cake was sliced more thinly than ever, with 270 individual winners.
It was clear that things were now out of control. The programme was extended by 20 races in 2004 and it has continued to grow. Last year the scheme included a record 406 races and no fewer than 315 individual horses, also a record, claimed a share of the prestige. Minor adjustments in 2014 – one race fewer in Group 1 and Group 2, and a rise of two in Group 3 – means the overall total remains the same. Let’s be realistic. The European Pattern is no longer what it was and what it was originally intended to be.
All this irrational growth has just provided opportunities for horses to avoid one another, to make racing less competitive, and to dispense specious honours. Can anyone argue that in 2013 there were 100 more horses worthy of recognition as a Pattern winner than there were in the late 1970s? Where is the evidence that we are now breeding better equine athletes? It is not to be found in the ratings.
The planned expulsion of Italy from the 2015 Pattern because of its failure to pay prize-money would wipe 30 races off the schedule. As that ongoing problem has meant that Italian Pattern races have been attracting very few runners from the UK, Ireland and France over the last two years, they should probably have been struck off the list for 2013 and 2014 as well.
There should be no temptation to add races to the schedule in 2015 to make up for the Italian expulsions. Instead, the Pattern committee should be looking to strip numerous other races of their bogus status and attempt to restore our faith in a system that we welcomed as a reliable measure of class in 1971 and could still believe in up to the turn of the century.

 

[PNkt]

I'm told that the only reason the Lockinge was upgraded was because Juddmonte said they would not sponsor the race unless it had G1 status. Now that they are no longer the sponsor of the race I wonder how long it will maintain its status, particularly as Newbury has rapidly gone downhill as a track in terms of prize money and appeal to trainers.

 

[Ron]

This is a very interesting thread with a lot of good points. I'm not too clever as to what should be a Group 1 and what shouldn't. If I had my way then unless a certain % of the declared runners were rated higher than a specified rating that race would be graded accordingly for that year. I find it quite annoying when I see arguments that such and such horse has x Group 1s so it is better than another that only has or had y Group 1s. To me that is completely meaningless. As pointed out above, the increasing number of Group 1s allows "G1 horses" to avoid each other, making it easier to collect a G1. At the end of the day if a horse wasn't measured by the number of G1 races it's won then it wouldn't matter. Maybe a G1 is just a name given to a race that exceeds £x prize money but that just gets screwed by rich owners sponsoring races that they believe their horses can win. Or as mentioned above a race will only get sponsorship if it is upgraded to G1 status.

Personally, I don't pay any attention to the value of G1 wins. I'm only interested in the quality of opposition the horse has beaten and in what manner. The only objection I would have is in having early season G1 races for 2yos as I believe it to be unhealthy for the horse and sport generally.

 

[PNkt]

Group races are decided according to the year end ratings of the winners over a period of time. If the ratings are consistently high the race can be put forward to be upgraded and if they are too low the race risks being downgraded. Once a race has been given its Group status there are minimum prize money levels which must be met. High prize money does not equal G1 status, otherwise the Grand National would be a G1!

The decisions about upgrading/downgrading are not taken by the BHA but by the European Pattern Committee, each country has to put forward a case for their races to be upgraded. It is this Committee who have decided to strip all Italian black-type races of their status from 2015 onwards due to the chaos in their racing industry.