The Derby, run at Epsom Downs since 1780, remains the race the Flat season is built around, paired each June with the Oaks for fillies.
Epsom Downs Racecourse in Epsom, Surrey, holds the Oaks on Friday 4 June 2027 and the Derby on Saturday 5 June. Both are among Flat racing’s five Classics, and the Derby is the race the season is built around.
The Derby was invented at a party in 1779 held to mark the first running of the Oaks. The new race was to be named after either the host, the 12th Earl of Derby, or his guest Sir Charles Bunbury.
Legend says a coin decided it. The more probable account is that Bunbury, then Steward of the Jockey Club, deferred to his host. The first Derby was run on Thursday 4 May 1780 and won by Diomed, a colt Bunbury owned, for prize money of £1,065 15s.
The track climbs, falls and turns sharply left at Tattenham Corner, on ground whose camber shifts under a horse at speed. A Derby winner has to stay a mile and a half, handle a slope and keep its balance under pressure. Nothing else in the Classic programme asks all three at once.
Ladies Day runs the Oaks on the Friday, and the Derby itself is run at 16:00 on the Saturday.