TDN Weekend

Originally run over two miles, the champi- onship race has since 1948 been contested over a mile at weight for age terms. The race attracts the best horses in South Afri- ca, the winner of the race being heavily in- fluential in determining that year's Horse of the Year at the annual Equus Awards. To illustrate this point, three of South Africa's last four Horse of the Years have won the race in the year they achieved their titles. The winner of the LQP gains an automatic invitation to America's Breeders' Cup. How- ever, due to South Africa's onerous export quarantine restrictions, the winners of this race have infrequently been tested against the best in the world. The last to do so, how- ever, certainly proved himself worthy. That horse was 2013 victor, Variety Club (Var), who was rated the third best horse in the world in 2014 by the International Feder- ation of Horseracing Authorities after he annexed the best of Hong Kong, including local superstar Able Friend (Shamardal), by four lengths in the G1 Champions Mile. The Queen's Plate has been sponsored since 2005 by L'Ormarins, a wine estate based ap- proximately an hour outside Cape Town in the exquisite region of Franschhoek at the foot of the Groot Drakenstein ("Dragon Stone") mountain range. The estate is home to three of the key sponsors of the event: Anthonij Rupert Wyne, Franschhoek Motor Museum and Drakenstein Stud Farm. The latter of which provides the thoroughbred connection to the day, and whose blue and white racing silks are the inspiration for the event's pervasive eye-catching colour theme. Drakenstein Stud Farm is one of South Africa's leading breeders, having produced the likes of five time G1 winner Inara (Trip- pi) and currently home to seven stallions: reigning Champion Sire Trippi (End Sweep), 09

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