Scenes & Winners From International Gold Cup Day October 24.
Great Meadow played host to eight steeplechase and two flat races Saturday October 24 as part of the annual International Gold Cup card in The Plains. Like many other events in this challenging year of the Covid pandemic, no spectators were allowed. A total of $135,000 in purse monies were distributed.
Rebecca Shepherd’s Curve of Stones captured the $25,000 International Gold Cup with Barry Foley up. The 9-year-old Arch gelding came to Great Meadow fresh off a victory in the $40,000 National Sporting Library and Museum Cup Stakes October 10 at Middleburg. David Bourke trains the Cup champ, who has ten wins overall now and a bankroll of $218,450.
National Steeplechase Association sanctioned events also took place this fall in Charlottesville at the Foxfield and at the Middleburg Fall Races at Glenwood Park. The annual Montpelier Hunt Races, which were scheduled for November 7, have been cancelled.
The Gold Cup card finished off the 2020 live race calendar in Virginia which featured delayed spring NSA meets at Middleburg and Great Meadow, an abbreviated summer thoroughbred meet at Colonial Downs in New Kent that included a handful of jump races, and two harness meets at the Shenandoah Cojunty Fairgrounds in Woodstock — a 3-day VHHA Matinee Meet and the 10-day Shenandoah Downs season.
Here are some pics from the Gold Cup card courtesy of photogragher Douglas Lees and several supplied by the VEA.