POV: Still A Special Race (Nick Lightfoot)

In our daily POV column – Racing TV presenter and analyst Nick Lightfoot makes the case for why the Epsom Derby is still as special as ever…

Four-time Derby winning jockey Ryan Moore said; “It’s the Derby – the Derby. It’s the most important race of the year”.

I agree.

My memories of the Derby start sometime at the end of the 1990s – I don’t quite remember the first year I watched on TV, but I can’t quite recall a time where the Derby wasn’t present in my mind each year once June approached.

Do I still love the Derby as much as I did when first becoming aware of it? Yes. However, outside of my personal connection to the race, does Derby Day still retain the same level of importance as it did even as recently as 30 years ago when I fell in love with it? Perhaps not. But to my mind Epsom on the first Saturday of June each year mixes the absolute brilliance of what the thoroughbred can achieve with the style and tradition of the great British sporting summer.

Just by typing ‘Epsom Derby’ into YouTube and you are escorted down a lane of memories well worth getting lost in:

I’ve attached a link to High Chaparral’s defeat of brilliant stablemate Hawk Wing in 2002 and it makes me think two things – A. I think it is probably my favourite running of the Derby [sorry Galileo, Sea The Stars etc].

If you have a watch at around the two-minute marker in the video, just as Johnny Murtagh fires the magnificent High Chaparral up the straight, you’ll see the sights off track which make Derby Day the occasion that it is [or was]. It is a scene buzzing with life; a huge crowd enjoying the infield and just imagine the scenes in the grandstand? I am being nostalgic, of course, and even 20+ years later the images are a bit different.

The days when parliament shut early and the folk of London flocked to the Downs are a thing of the past, to an extent. The crowds of 100,000+ no longer converge at the downs and there’s no getting away from the fact that attendances in the 21st century have fallen to levels lower than all in racing want to see. Clashes with the FA Cup final, train strikes, ‘changing consumer behaviour’, ‘cost of living’ and societal changes all cited as reasons. There is plenty of work to be done. But does the Derby itself need changing? The mile and a half, three-year-olds colt classic that it is? Not to my mind.

It is over 70 years since the death of Federico Tesio, a man considered a genius in the world of thoroughbred breeding. Yet even in 2025 his famous line ‘The Thoroughbred exists because its selection has depended, not on experts, technicians or zoologists, but on a piece of wood – The winning post of the Epsom Derby’ still resonates, and does so in particular to John Magnier and the Coolmore operation. Tesio’s famous words can be found adorning a wall at Coolmore Stud. And the breeding goliath’s association with the Derby, in the modern era at least, is unparalleled. Legendary 2001 Derby winner Galileo went on to produce no fewer than FIVE Derby winners himself, while his grandsons have carried his baton just fine.

We know that the Derby is still the dream at Coolmore, while few could forget the scenes when William Buick wearing royal blue aboard Masar powered to victory in 2018, providing Sheikh Mohammed and Godolphin with their first ever winner of the great race. So, if the legacy owner/breeding operations haven’t given up on the Derby, why should we?

What would take its place? Change the distance like the French equivalent? Not for me. Location? No – the race wouldn’t be the race that it is without the unique set of challenges that is Epsom. If we could rewind 250 years, would we, with the level of hindsight we have now, canvas changing the setting? I certainly wouldn’t!

Enjoy the race for what it is. ‘The Ultimate Test of the thoroughbred’. It’s a tradition after all. And although changes might be needed off track perhaps, and times change, and eras change [Tesio’s quote ‘on a piece of wood’’ is now a little outdated…. “it’s metal now, actually”– Andrew Cooper, Racing Director Epsom, May 2025] – the Derby at Epsom should be here to stay as bold and bright as ever.

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