NHK Mile Cup

The NHK Mile Cup (NHKマイルカップ (NHK Mairu Kappu)) is a Grade 1 flat horse race in Japan for three-year-old thoroughbred colts and fillies, run over a distance of 1,600 metres (approximately one mile) on the turf at Tokyo Racecourse in May.[1]

NHK Mile Cup

Grade 1 race
Location	Tokyo Racecourse, Fuchu, Tokyo, Tokyo
Inaugurated	1996
Race type	Thoroughbred
Website	japanracing.jp/
Race information
Distance	1600 meters (About 8 furlongs / 1 mile)
Surface	Turf
Track	Left-handed
Qualification	3-y-o, colts & Fillies only, Thoroughbreds
Weight	Colt 57 kg, Filly 55 kg; 2 kg allowance for Southern Hemisphere-breds
Purse	¥ 175,200,000 (as of 2015) 1st: ¥ 92,000,000

The 6th (2001) winner Kurofune

The NHK Mile Cup is sponsored by the Japanese public broadcasting organization NHK, and as such, this race is broadcast not only on Fuji TV (one of NHK's competitors) but on one of the NHK channels that cover horse racing (NHK General TV; the other, BS-1, covers certain other races such as the Japan Cup). (In Japanese horseracing, "Sponsor" doesn't mean the man or organisation provide prize money. They provide only the prize, cup, trophy etc.)

Before the year 2001, it was the only colt and fillies G1 race that non-Japanese bred three-year-olds could participate, which led to this race being considered as the "Japanese Derby for non-Japanese bred horse" until foreign-bred horse restrictions were lifted in 2001. Until 2010 it was limited to domestic-trained horses, but these restrictions were removed that year (along with the Japanese classics). A maximum of nine foreign horses are allowed entry in the NHK Mile Cup. It is considered one of the prep races for both the Yushun Himba (the Japanese Oaks) and the Tokyo Yushun (the Japanese Derby).[2]

Step races

	Race name	Grade	Racecourse	Distance
1	Mainichi Hai	GIII	Hanshin	Turf 1800m
2	Margelet Stakes	OP	Hanshin	Turf 1400m
3	New Zealand Trophy	GII	Nakayama	Turf 1600m
4	Oka Sho	GI	Hanshin	Turf 1600m
5	Satsuki Sho	GI	Nakayama	Turf 2000m

The New Zealand Trophy is the only formal trial race for NHK Mile Cup. The top three finishers of that race will be granted participation right in this race. If a horse from the National Association of Racing (NAR) finished in top three in the New Zealand Trophy, at most of two extra participation rights will be issued within the other four races.

Winners

(Winners in italic are also later winners from either Yushun Himba or Tokyo Yushun that year)

Year	Winner	Jockey	Trainer	Owner	Time
1996	Taiki Fortune	Yoshitomi Shibata	Yoshiyasu Takahashi	Taiki Farm	1:32.6
1997	Seeking the Pearl	Yutaka Take	Hideyuki Mori	Tomoko Uenaka	1:33.1
1998	El Condor Pasa	Hitoshi Matoba	Yoshitaka Ninomiya	Takashi Watanabe	1:33.7
1999	Symboli Indy	Norihiro Yokoyama	Kazuo Fujisawa	Symboli Bokujo	1:33.8
2000	Eagle Cafe	Yukio Okabe	Futoshi Kojima	Kiyoshi Nishikawa	1:33.5
2001	Kurofune	Yutaka Take	Kunihide Matsuda	Makoto Kaneko	1:33.0
2002	Telegnosis	Masaki Katsuura	Hiroaki Sugiura	Shadai Racehorse co.	1:33.1
2003	Win Kluger	Koshiro Take	Shigeki Matsumoto	Win Co. Ltd.	1:34.2
2004	King Kamehameha	Katsumi Ando	Kunihide Matsuda	Makoto Kaneko	1:32.5
2005	Rhein Kraft	Yuichi Fukunaga	Tsutomu Setoguchi	Shigemasa Ohsawa	1:33.6
2006	Logic	Yutaka Take	Kojiro Hashiguchi	Koji Maeda	1:33.2
2007	Pink Kameo	Hiroyuki Uchida	Sakae Kunieda	Kaneko Makoto Holdings Co., Ltd.	1:34.3
2008	Deep Sky	Hirofumi Shii	Mitsugu Kon	Toshio Fukami	1:34.2
2009	Jo Cappuccino	Kota Fujioka	Kazuya Nakatake	Keiko Ueda	1:32.4
2010	Danon Chantilly	Katsumi Ando	Kunihide Matsuda	Danox Co. Ltd.	1:31.4
2011	Grand Prix Boss	Craig Williams	Yoshihito Yahagi	Grand Prix Co. Ltd.	1:32.2
2012	Curren Black Hill	Shin-ichiro Akiyama	Osamu Hirata	Takashi Suzuki	1:34.5
2013	Meiner Ho O	Daichi Shibata	Yoshihiro Hatakeyama	K Thoroughbred Club Ruffian	1:32.7
2014	Mikki Isle	Suguru Hamanaka	Hidetaka Otonashi	Mizuki Noda	1:33.2
2015	Clarity Sky	Norihiro Yokoyama	Yasuo Tomomichi	Tadakuni Sugiyama	1:33.5
2016	Major Emblem	Christophe Lemaire	Yasuhito Tamura	Sunday Racing	1:32.8
2017	Aerolithe	Norihiro Yokoyama	Takanori Kikuzawa	Sunday Racing	1:32.3
2018	Keiai Nautique	Yusuke Fujioka	Osamu Hirata	Kazuhiro Kameda	1:32.8
2019	Admire Mars	Mirco Demuro	Yasuo Tomomichi	Riichi Kondo	1:32.4
2020	Lauda Sion	Mirco Demuro	Takashi Saito	Silk Racing	1:32.5

See also

• Horse racing in Japan
• List of Japanese flat horse races

References

• Racing Post:
  • 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005
  • 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015
  • 2016, 2017

1. "2011.05.03 2011 NHK Mile Cup (G1) - Preview - News - Horse Racing in Japan". Japanracing.jp. 2011-05-03. Retrieved 2011-12-24.
2. "Japanese Derby hopefuls look to cement credentials in NHK Mile Cup". Thoroughbred Times. 2010-05-07. Retrieved 2011-12-24.