The influential figures of the Yorkshire Oaks
The 2011 Group 1 Yorkshire Oaks (British Champions’ Series) was won by the royal blues of the Godolphin. The four-year-old, Blue Bunting, paired with the best jockey that the Godolphin string has, Frankie Dettori, edged past Vita Nova by ¾ of a length.
"She's so tough and she's in season today and her mind wasn't exactly on the job and it made it really hard work for me. She's never going to be flash and winning by a large distance but she's very hard to get past."Being in season didn't help but she's
very tough and her form all year has been red hot.
Sir Henry Cecil, the trainer of the runner-up filly, Vita Nova, was joyous even with the next to best status and commented:
"She likes give in the ground and maybe if it had been softer she would have finished closer but take nothing away from the winner”.
The filly was paired up with jockey, Tom Queally.
The strong finishing of the Mahmood Al Zarooni trained enhanced her chances for the third leg of the Triple Crown, the Ladbrokes St Leger at Doncaster in September. The race however was won by the team of trainer, John Gosden with his trainee, Masked Marvel
and the stable jockey, William Buick.
It has been since 2006 that the race has been sponsored by the Darley Stud. The set trend of the race sees participation of the fillies who had previously raced in the Epsom Oaks. In 1861, Brown Duchess became the first mare to win both the racing events,
and the most recent to have earned the honour is Alexandrova, she landed both the races in 2006.
The race is held on the second day of the Ebor Festival meeting at York which continues for four days.
The dominating training figures of the Group 1 Yorkshire Oaks, Mathew Dawson and Sir Michael Stoute, have won the race nine times. The latter won the 2002 and 2003 edition of the race with the same under charge, Islington.
The most celebrated jockey for the race is, Fred Archer, with eight wins from 1875 to 1886.
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