Horse Racing Trivia
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88 free Horse Racing trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Horse racing is the sport of kings and the sport of the 100/1 shot: a ten-length Derby winner can vanish into the night, a jockey can ride all seven winners on one card, and a riderless horse can still win the Palio. Every question here is a story someone might tell you at the rail. The 88 questions cover the great races, from the Kentucky Derby and the Grand National to the Melbourne Cup and the Arc, the horses and riders who defined them, the Triple Crowns on both sides of the Atlantic, the difference between the flat and the jumps, and the betting slang and furlongs that confuse first-timers. A few take you to 2020, when the Derby moved and the Grand National went virtual. It suits a pub quiz, a Derby-day party or a Cheltenham week warm-up. Play it on your phone with instant answers and explanations, or print it for the table.
30 of 88 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01By what margin did Secretariat win the 1973 Belmont Stakes in a record 2:24?
31 lengths
31 lengths broke the 25-length record Count Fleet had set in 1943, and Secretariat's rival Sham, who went with his fierce early pace, tired and faded.
Q 02Which Louisville track, topped by twin spires since 1895, has hosted the Kentucky Derby since 1875?
Churchill Downs
Churchill Downs is named for John and Henry Churchill, who leased the land to their nephew Meriwether Lewis Clark Jr., grandson of the explorer William Clark.
Q 03Which Grand National fence is named for a captain unseated there in the first official race of 1839?
Becher's Brook
Becher's Brook is jumped twice, as the 6th and 22nd fence, and Captain Martin Becher lay in its water after his fall until the rest of the field had jumped over him.
Q 04Which three-time Grand National winner, trained on Southport sands, is buried at Aintree's winning post?
Red Rum
Red Rum won in 1973, 1974 and 1977 and was runner-up in the two years between, and his name is simply the last three letters of his dam, Mared, and his sire, Quorum.
Q 05Which New Zealand-born 1930 Melbourne Cup winner has his hide, skeleton and heart in three museums?
Phar Lap
Phar Lap's heart is in Canberra, his hide in Melbourne and his skeleton in Wellington, and 'a heart as big as Phar Lap' became an Australian phrase for great courage.
Q 06Which Henry Cecil-trained colt retired unbeaten in 14 races with a record Timeform rating of 147?
Frankel
Frankel was named after the late American trainer Bobby Frankel, and he was rated the best racehorse in the world from May 2011 until the day he retired.
Q 07Which jockey's seven winners from seven rides at Ascot in 1996 cost bookmakers an estimated £40 million?
Frankie Dettori
Frankie Dettori's 'Magnificent Seven' came at combined odds of 25,095-1, and the flying dismount he celebrates with was taught to him in California by Angel Cordero Jr.
Q 08Which suffragette died after stepping in front of the King's horse Anmer at the 1913 Epsom Derby?
Emily Davison
Emily Davison was carrying a ticket to a suffragette dance that evening and a diary of appointments for the following week, which suggests she never intended to die under the horse.
Q 09Which record ten-length 1981 Epsom Derby winner was stolen by an armed gang in 1983 and never found?
Shergar
Shergar's captors demanded a £2 million ransom in a plot a former IRA member later attributed to the organisation, and his remains are thought to lie near Ballinamore in County Leitrim.
Q 10Which Paris racecourse stages the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe each October?
Longchamp
Longchamp sits in the Bois de Boulogne, and while it was closed for rebuilding the 2016 and 2017 Arcs were run at Chantilly instead.
Q 11Which racecourse, opened in 2010 with a grandstand holding 60,000, hosts the Dubai World Cup?
Meydan
Meydan replaced Nad Al Sheba, and its synthetic Tapeta track was torn up for dirt before the 2015 race after US trainers stayed away.
Q 12Which chaser won three straight Cheltenham Gold Cups from 1964 and holds a record Timeform rating of 212?
Arkle
Arkle's 212 is the highest mark Timeform has ever given a steeplechaser, and fan mail addressed to nothing more than his name and his country still reached his yard.
Q 13Which California track, opened in 1938 under Jack L. Warner, hosted the first Breeders' Cup in 1984?
Hollywood Park
Hollywood Park ran its last race in December 2013 after 75 years, and SoFi Stadium, home of the NFL's Rams and Chargers, now stands on the site.
Q 21Which Thoroughbred foundation stallion was ridden by his captain-owner at the 1690 Battle of the Boyne?
Byerley Turk
The Byerley Turk was Captain Robert Byerley's war horse in King William's campaign of 1689-90, and his male line survives today through the 18th-century leading sire Herod.
Q 22Which unbeaten 1760s racehorse, winner of all 18 of his starts, tops most Thoroughbred pedigrees?
Eclipse
Eclipse so outclassed his rivals that 'Eclipse first, the rest nowhere' became a byword for dominance, and his skeleton is kept at the Royal Veterinary College.
Q 23Which Australian mare retired unbeaten in 25 starts, including a 2012 Royal Ascot win by a head?
Black Caviar
Q 14Which bet, coined in the 1970s, pays only if you name the first three finishers in exact order?
Trifecta
The trifecta fuses 'tri-' with the perfecta, a bet on the first two in order whose own name was clipped from the Spanish 'quiniela perfecta'.
Q 15Which monarch founded Ascot in 1711 on open heath spotted while out riding from Windsor Castle?
Queen Anne
Queen Anne judged the heath 'ideal for horses to gallop at full stretch', and the Royal Meeting each June opens with the Queen Anne Stakes.
Q 16Which mare won three straight Melbourne Cups from 2003, the only horse to win the race more than twice?
Makybe Diva
Makybe Diva honours Maureen, Kylie, Belinda, Diane and Vanessa, who worked for her owner Tony Santic, and she was bred in Britain before being trained in Australia.
Q 17Which 100/1 shot won the 1967 Grand National after a pile-up at the 23rd fence, now named after him?
Foinavon
Foinavon's jockey John Buckingham had never ridden in the race before, and neither the owner nor the trainer bothered to attend, the trainer having gone to ride at Worcester instead.
Q 18Which Queen Mother-owned horse collapsed yards from the post while leading the 1956 Grand National?
Devon Loch
Devon Loch was ridden by Dick Francis, who went on to write more than 40 bestselling thrillers, and 'to do a Devon Loch' is still shorthand for a collapse on the brink of victory.
Q 19Which jockey, diagnosed with testicular cancer in 1979, won the 1981 Grand National on Aldaniti?
Bob Champion
Bob Champion's recovery and win became the 1984 film Champions, with John Hurt in the lead, and the Bob Champion Cancer Trust he founded in 1983 has raised millions for research.
Q 20On which day is the Melbourne Cup, a public holiday across much of Victoria, always run?
First Tuesday in November
The first Tuesday in November sees the race start at 3 pm, when the country pauses for the 3,200-metre handicap billed as 'the race that stops a nation'.
Black Caviar's jockey Luke Nolen eased up too early at Ascot and barely held on, later admitting it was 'an error that every apprentice is taught not to do'.
Q 24A blanket of which flower is draped over the Kentucky Derby winner, giving the race its nickname?
Roses
Roses earned the race its 'Run for the Roses' tag, and the blanket goes each year to a winner that, being a three-year-old, gets only one shot at it.
Q 25Which jockey, with 8,833 career wins, became the oldest Kentucky Derby winner at 54 aboard Ferdinand?
Bill Shoemaker
Bill Shoemaker was so small at birth that, family legend says, he was kept alive in a shoebox by the stove, yet his win total stood as a world record when he retired.
Q 26Which jockey is the only rider of two US Triple Crown winners, Whirlaway and Citation?
Eddie Arcaro
Eddie Arcaro also won the Kentucky Derby five times, a record later equalled, and fellow riders simply called him 'the Master' for setting the standard in race riding.
Q 27Which jockey, Triple Crown winner on Affirmed at 18, moved to Britain and twice won the Epsom Derby?
Steve Cauthen
Steve Cauthen became the first jockey to win both the Kentucky Derby and the Epsom Derby, taking the latter on Slip Anchor in 1985 and Reference Point in 1987, and topped the British jockeys' table three times.
Q 28Which jockey, nicknamed 'the Long Fellow' for his height, won the Epsom Derby a record nine times?
Lester Piggott
Lester Piggott was tall for a flat jockey, served 366 days in prison for tax fraud, and came back at 54 to win the Breeders' Cup Mile within two weeks of his return.
Q 29Which jump jockey, top rider in all 20 of his seasons, was the first jockey named BBC Sports Personality?
Tony McCoy
Tony McCoy rode a record 4,358 winners, topped the table in every season he rode as a professional, and needed 15 attempts to win the Grand National, on Don't Push It in 2010.
Q 30Which city's Happy Valley racecourse, first built in 1845, holds its meetings on Wednesday nights?
Hong Kong
Hong Kong's Happy Valley, one of two tracks run by the Hong Kong Jockey Club alongside Sha Tin, saw at least 590 people die in 1918 when a collapsing stand set fire to bamboo matting.