Vincennes Winter Meeting Preview.
Another year has passed, and all is now in readiness for the 2022-23 Vincennes Winter Meeting. Scheduled to commence Thursday 3 November until 4 March, the best European horses will be competing at the 'temple of trotting'.
A revamp of the feature Group race programme has ensured Championship races over the four months with the feature event of the Festival, the Prix d'Amerique Legend race, to be run on the last Sunday in January, the 29th 2023.
In total there will be 745 races programmed with €40.3m in prizemoney on offer which is an increase of €2.5m from last season. On average prizemoney will be €54,824 per race with 73% for harness and 27% mounted. There are 40 open international events and 135 European.
Changes to programming are of note with some races replaced, new races introduced, and traditional dates changed. A record 16 Group One races will be run commencing with a new race addition – the Prix Ready Cash to be held on Sunday 11 December. This is a race for three-year-olds and replaces the Critérium des 3 ans which is now held in September alongside the four-and-five-year-old Critériums.
The 18 December meeting has received a big boost for mounted horses with a Championship Day programmed featuring three G1 races - the three-year-old Prix de Vincennes (moved forward a week) and the introduction of two new contests - the Etrier World Cup des 4 ans (Prix Jag de Boullouet) and the Etrier World Cup des 5 ans (Prix Bilibili). The latter two events will become key trial races and the winner of both races will receive immediate inclusion into the Prix du Cornulier to be held five weeks later, 22 January. Outstanding mare Roxanne Griff won the race twice (2014-15) as has Bilibili (2019-20) and he also holds the race record of 1'11"2. Flamme du Goutier ran second in 2021 before winning this years' edition. She has returned to the racetrack in great form having won a Grade A driven race – showing her diversity in both harness and mounted races – this past week at Vincennes when an odds-on favourite.
Christmas Eve will see the Critérium Continental, the G1 mobile contest for four-year-olds with a guaranteed entry to the Prix d'Amerique for the winner and Prix Tenor de Baune for five-year-olds which has received a worthy upgrade to become a G1 contest and is also a qualifying race for the winner to gain a start in the Prix d'Amerique a month later. Both Bold Eagle and Face Time Bourbon were able to complete the Critérium Continental-Prix d'Amerique double. Readily Express completed the Tenor de Baune-Prix d'Amerique double in the 2017/18 season whilst Belina Josselyn won the race in 2016 but had to wait until 2019 for her Prix d'Amerique win. The Tenor de Baune race is named after Ténor de Baune who went into the Prix d'Amerique with an undefeated record as a five-year-old.
November 20 will see the first of the affectionately named 'B' races being held. These are the traditional feature 'big races' of the Winter Meeting and G2 qualifying event for 4–10-year-olds heading towards the Prix d'Amerique. Commencing with the Prix de Bretagne (2700m), the other three 'B' races to be run will be Prix du Bourbonnais (11 December) (2850m), Prix de Bourgogne (1 January) (2100m) and Prix de Belgique (15 January) (2850m).
One of the most popular meetings is held on the first Sunday in December with the running of the final of the Grand National du Trot series, a race at G2 level. The field is assembled based on points accumulated in G3 heats held at fifteen provincial courses from March-November. Currently Eire d'Helios leads on 56 points from Django du Bocage (49 points) and Echo de Chanlecy (44 points). There are two more rounds to go at Nantes on 9 November with the final round at Mauquenchy on the 23rd.
There will be two Group races on the opening day of the festival (Thursday 3 Nov) with the Prix Xavier de Saint Palais (G2) for three-year-olds and Prix des Cévennes (G3) for older horses.
