Run over one mile and four furlongs at Longchamp Racecourse in the Bois de Boulogne, west of Paris, traditionally on the first Sunday in October, the Prix de l’Arc Triomphe has the distinction of being the most valuable horse race in Europe. With a prize fund of €5,000,000, of which €2,857,000 goes to the winner, the prestigious race regularly attracts the crème de la crème of middle distance talent from around the world.
The jockey who has won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe most often is soon to be retired Lanfranco ‘Frankie’ Dettori, who has already announced that he will hang up his boots at the end of the 2023 season, probably on November 4, after the Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California. Born in Milan, Italy on December 15, 1970, Dettori was sent to Britain by his father, Gianfranco, in 1985 to become apprenticed to fellow Italian Luca Cumani at Bedford House Stables in Newmarket.
In 1994, Dettori became retained jockey for Goldolphin, the powerful stable founded by Sheikh Mohammed Al Maktoum, Emir of Dubai, and it was for his nephew, Sheikh Saeed Maktoum Al Maktoum, that he first won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe on Lammtarra in 1995. Further success in the royal blue silks of his new employer followed on Sakhee in 2001 and Marienbard in 2002, but Dettori would not win the ‘Arc’ again for another 13 years, by which time he had involved in anacrimonious split with Godolphin and served a six-month ban after testing positive for cocaine.
However, with the backing of Newmarket trainer John Gosden, with whom he had enjoyed a successful partnership in the nineties, his career recovered from the doldrums. Dettori has since won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe another three times, on Golden Horn in 2015 and Enable in 2017 and 2018; both horses were trained by Gosden.