In 1872, Col.
Meriwether Lewis Clark Jr., grandson of
William Clark of the
Lewis and Clark Expedition, traveled to England, visiting
Epsom in Surrey where
The Derby had been running annually since 1780. From there, Clark went on to
Paris where a group of racing enthusiasts had formed the
French Jockey Club in 1863. They had organized the
Grand Prix de Paris at
Longchamp, which at the time was the greatest race in France. Returning home to Kentucky, Clark organized the Louisville Jockey Club and Driving Park Association to raise money for building quality racing facilities just outside the city. First known as the Louisville Jockey Club grounds, seven years later the track was commonly referred to as Churchill Downs, named for John and Henry Churchill, who provided the land for the racetrack. The naming went official in 1937. , ridden by jockey
Jimmy Winkfield won the Derby in
1902. The Kentucky Derby was first run at miles (12
furlongs; 2.4 km) the same distance as the Epsom Derby, before changing lengths in 1896 to its current miles (10 furlongs; 2 km). On May 17, 1875, in front of an estimated crowd of 10,000 people, a field of 15 three-year-old horses contested the first Derby. Under jockey
Oliver Lewis, a colt named
Aristides, who was trained by future
Hall of Famer Ansel Williamson, won the inaugural Derby. Later that year, Lewis rode Aristides to a second-place finish in the Belmont Stakes. In these early decades, Black jockeys were very influential at the Derby. Horses, including race horses, had been cared for, trained and exercised by Blacks in the ante-bellum slave-holding states and this expertise laid the groundwork for future racing standards. Jockeying was seen as activity unsuitable for Whites during that era and in the decades after the Civil War when it was becoming lucrative. Black jockeys dominated the Derby in all the years before 1894, except for one. In 1886 the track, which had been successful, ran into financial difficulties when a protracted,
gambling-related horseman boycott removed it from the upper echelons of racing until just after the turn of the 20th century. In 1894 the New Louisville Jockey Club was incorporated with new capital and improved facilities. The rise of on-track betting and increasing audience sizes brought larger purse sizes, and this began to attract White jockeys to the profession. White jockeys on tracks everywhere began to use violence to attack and intimidate Black jockeys and the horses they rode. This caused horse owners to stop hiring Black jockeys. Though they were consistent Derby winners, Black jockeys began to disappear from the Derby after 1894. Jimmy Winkfield was the last Black jockey to win the derby and Black jockeys were gone by 1911. But they had instituted innovations now universal in the sport. After his racing career, Oliver Lewis began collecting and analyzing racing data, developing a system very much like the ones used today. Initially a successful venue, the track ran into financial difficulties due to a protracted, gambling-related horseman boycott removing it from the upper echelons of racing that would last until just after the turn of the 20th century. Thoroughbred owners began sending their successful Derby horses to compete in two other races. These two are the Preakness Stakes at the
Pimlico Race Course, in
Baltimore, and the Belmont Stakes in
Elmont, New York. The three races offered large purses, and in
1919,
Sir Barton became the first horse to win all three races. However, the term "
Triple Crown" did not come into use for another eleven years. In
1930, when
Gallant Fox became the second horse to win all three races, sportswriter
Charles Hatton brought the phrase into American usage. Fueled by the media, public interest in the possibility of a "superhorse" that could win the Triple Crown began in the weeks leading up to the Derby. Two years after the term went in use, the race (until that time ran in mid-May since inception) changed the date to the first Saturday in May. This change allows for a specific schedule for the Triple Crown races. Since 1931, the order of Triple Crown races has been the Kentucky Derby first, followed by the Preakness Stakes and then the Belmont Stakes. Before 1931, eleven times the Preakness was run before the Derby. On May 12, 1917, and again on May 13, 1922, the Preakness and the Derby took place on the same day. On eleven occasions the Belmont Stakes was run before the Preakness Stakes, and in 2020, the Belmont was run first, then the Kentucky Derby, and the Preakness Stakes last. in 1901 On May 16, 1925, the first live radio broadcast of the Kentucky Derby aired on
WHAS as well as on
WGN in Chicago. On May 7, 1949, the first television coverage of the Kentucky Derby took place, produced by
WAVE-TV, the NBC affiliate in Louisville. This coverage was aired live in the Louisville market and sent to NBC as a kinescope newsreel recording for national broadcast. On May 3, 1952, the first national television coverage of the Kentucky Derby took place, aired from then-
CBS affiliate
WHAS-TV. In 1954, the purse exceeded US$100,000 for the first time. In 1968,
Dancer's Image became the first horse to win the race and then face disqualification. A
urine test revealed traces of
phenylbutazone (an
anti-inflammatory painkiller drug) inside Dancer's Image.
Forward Pass won after a protracted legal battle by the owners of Dancer's Image (which they lost). Forward Pass thus became the eighth winner for
Calumet Farm. Unexpectedly, the regulations at Kentucky thoroughbred race tracks were changed some years later, allowing horses to run on phenylbutazone. In 1970,
Diane Crump became the first female jockey to ride in the Derby, finishing 15th aboard Fathom. The fastest time ever run in the Derby was in
1973 at 1:59.4 minutes, when
Secretariat broke the record set by
Northern Dancer in
1964. Also during that race, Secretariat did something unique in Triple Crown races: for each successive quarter run, his times were faster. Although the races do not record times for non-winners, in 1973 Sham finished second, two and a half lengths behind Secretariat in the same race. Using the thoroughbred racing convention of one length equaling one-fifth of a second to calculate
Sham's time, he also finished in under two minutes. Another sub-two-minute finish, only the third, was set in
2001 by
Monarchos at 1:59.97, the first year the race used hundredths of seconds instead of fifths in timing. In 2005, the
purse distribution for the Derby changed, so that horses finishing fifth would henceforth receive a share of the purse; previously only the first four finishers did so. The Kentucky Derby began offering $3 million in purse money in 2019. Churchill Downs officials have cited the success of
historical race wagering terminals at their Derby City Gaming facility in Louisville as a factor behind the purse increase. The Derby first offered a $1 million purse in 1996; it was doubled to $2 million in 2005. In 2020, the Derby was postponed from May 2 to September 5 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This was the second time in history the race had been postponed, the other being in 1945.
Rich Strike, a
reserve who only made it into the final field after a late scratching, won the
race in 2022 at final odds of 80:1 and parimutuel betting payouts were even larger. , its 150th running, with one of the twin spires in the background In January 2024, the purse for the Kentucky Derby was increased to $5 million.
Attendance Millions of people from around the world bet at various live tracks and online sportsbooks. In 2017, a crowd of 158,070 watched Always Dreaming win the Derby, making it the seventh biggest attendance in the history of the racetrack. The track reported a wagering total of $209.2 million from all the sources on all the races on the Kentucky Derby Day program. It was a 9% increase compared to the total of $192.6 million in 2016 and an increase of 8% over the previous record set in 2015 of $194.3 million. TwinSpires, a platform for betting online and a partner of the Kentucky Derby and the Breeders' Cup, recorded $32.8 million in handle on the Churchill Down races for the Kentucky Derby Day program. This record was a 22% increase over the preceding year. On the Kentucky Derby race alone, the handle of TwinSpires was $20.1 million, which is a 22% rise compared to the prior year. The race often draws celebrities. HM
Queen Elizabeth II, on a visit to the United States, joined the racegoers at Churchill Downs in 2007.
Sponsorship The 2004 Kentucky Derby marked the first time that jockeys—as a result of a
court order—were allowed to wear corporate advertising
logos on their clothing. Norman Adams has been the designer of the Kentucky Derby Logo since 2002. On February 1, 2006, the Louisville-based
fast-food company
Yum! Brands, Inc. announced a corporate sponsorship deal to call the race "The Kentucky Derby presented by Yum! Brands." In 2018,
Woodford Reserve replaced Yum! Brands as the presenting sponsor. The Swiss watchmaker
Longines is the official sponsor timekeeper of the Kentucky Derby. ==Traditions==