Run The Numbers – Age won’t weary record-breaking Rothfire

For a thoroughbred to win a Group 1 race at two and still be racing at eight is a rare feat indeed.  Any top-level winning colt is usually whisked off to stud within a couple of years, with their racing days sacrificed for a more lucrative career in the breeding barn.

Similarly, elite-winning fillies also tend to have shortened racing careers, often sold or retired as broodmare prospects, where their progeny can help build on their legacy.

Hence, it is left to the geldings to carry the flame later into their careers. Rothfire, Saturday’s Doomben 10,000 winner, is not only the first two-year-old Group 1 winner in at least 30 years, and possibly ever, to subsequently win an elite race as an eight-year-old, but he is also one of just nine Australian juvenile Group 1 winners since 1996 to even continue racing at that age.

Sacred Elixir, the 2016 JJ Atkins Stakes winner, is the most recent before Rothfire, racing until age eight in New Zealand, while Romantic Touch’s career extended from his JJ Atkins winning season of 2012/13 until his final start in the 2019 HK Champions Mile in 2019.

The 2009 Golden Slipper winner Phelan Ready also raced until he was eight, while Reigning To Win’s long career took him from winning the then TJ Smith Classic at Eagle Farm in 2006 to his eventual retirement at age 12 at Longreach in 2016, 10 years later.

Mentality, a Champagne Stakes winner in 2006, also raced on to when he was eight, while before that you go back to the legendary Bomber Bill, who won a Karrakatta Plate (which was then a Group 1 race) in 1998 and was still racing at stakes company as an 11-year-old in 2007.

Coup De Grace, Anthems and Paint are the three other Australian Group 1-winning juveniles since 1996 who were still racing when they were eight.

That is nine in 124 individual Australian Group 1-winning two-year-olds since the start of 1996, or 7.2 per cent.

None of those had come close to winning a Group 1 race at eight until Rothfire swept past his rivals on Saturday.

That victory came 2170 days – 310 weeks, after his first in the 2020 JJ Atkins Stakes. We believe there has never been a greater gap between the first and second Australian Group 1 since the international Group 1 designation was introduced in the late 1970s.

To contextualise that gap, there have been 443 Group 1 races run in Australia since that day, and they have been won by 287 different horses.

In terms of the “Group 1 era” or gaps between first and last, or, in Rothfire’s case, the most recent Group 1 wins, we also believe it is an Australian record.    

The only one we could find longer in terms of future Group 1 races  – with a bit of help from fellow journalist Brad Bishop – was St Joel, winning the 1953 and 1959 editions of what was then the Invitation Stakes and would become the Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes. That day-span was 2192, exactly seven years, although it would be some years before that race would be recognised as elite.

Leaving that aside, we have Bomber Bill in second place with 1862 days between his Karrakatta Plate win and his Goodwood Handicap victory as a seven-year-old (he won the G1 Australia Stakes in between).

Manikato’s Group 1 era lasted from the 1978 Blue Diamond until the 1983 Futurity Stakes, when he was seven, and covered 1834 days.

Takeover Target also won Group 1 races across five different seasons, starting out when he was five in the 2024 Salinger Stakes and wrapping it up with 2009 Goodwood Handicap win at age nine. From his first to last elite victory, there were 1645 days or 235 weeks.

Fifth on the list is Tie The Knot, who won Group 1 races at ages three through seven. The time period between his first, in the 1997 Spring Champion Stakes, and his last, in the 2002 Chipping Norton Stakes, was 1603 days, or 229 weeks.

For further context, Winx’s extraordinary Group 1 era, where she won 25 top-level races in succession, was 1414 days, or 202 weeks. It started out at the 2015 Queensland Oaks and finished less than four years later in the Queen Elizabeth Stakes.

Also worth a mention is her legendarily tough stablemate, Who Shot Thebarman, who had 1502 days between his first Group 1 win in the 2014 Auckland Cup and his second and final Group 1 win in the 2018 Sydney Cup. For simplicity, we have generally not included New Zealand Group 1 wins in our data set for this article.

Of other horses in recent times, Country Tyrone had a ‘Group 1 era’ of 1414 days, Freemason 1400, Hey Doc 1329 and Alligator Blood 1324.

Top five longest Australian Group 1 eras

(Gap between first and last Group 1 win)

Rothfire – 2170  

Bomber Bill – 1862

Manikato – 1834

Takeover Target – 1645

Tie The Knot – 1603

Selected Others:

Winx: 1414

Freemason: 1400

Hey Doc: 1329

Alligator Blood: 1324