Dubai World Cup: All roads lead to Meydan

The venue will play host to a world-class day of racing

File photo

By Leslie Wilson Jr

Published: Sat 26 Mar 2022, 12:11 AM

The excitement is back with a bang and the stage is all set at Dubai’s iconic Meydan Racecourse today.

The majestic venue will play host to a world-class day of racing highlighted by the 26th renewal of the $30.5 (Dh112.03) million Dubai World Cup meeting.

The race more than lives up to its name as it one of the most prestigious thoroughbred contests on the planet and a major event on the UAE’s sporting and social calendar.

Featuring nine glittering races, including a $1 (Dh3.67) million event for Purebred Arabian horses, the day is a heady mix of high-class racing, glorious Arabian tradition, haute couture, culinary delights, and pulsating entertainment as the grand finale.

The Dubai World Cup meeting, which began in 1996 at Nad Al Sheba Racecourse and moved to Meydan Racecourse in 2010, has remained special to the thousands of sporting world.

The meeting is exemplary not just because it attracts the who’s who of the racing world, but because it has delivered some of the most memorable races ever run.

It was immortalised in the inaugural year following an epic race, where the legendary Cigar prevailed after a heart-stopped battle with Soul of the Matter.

Since that inaugural running the 2,000-metre dirt race has been won by some of the sport’s greatest horses among them Dubai Millennium (2000), Curlin (2008), California Chrome (2016), Arrogate (2017) and Thunder Snow (2018-19).

In the Meydan parade ring Arabic tradition has always reigned supreme with Sheikhs and Rulers from the UAE and the Arabian Gulf being joined by dignitaries, celebrities, and guests each year.

Indeed, the Dubai World Cup is a special party. The numbers speak for themselves with an average 60,000 fans in attendance each year.

And today promises to be no different.

Be there in your Saturday finery.

sports@khaleejtimes.com