Spion Kop (horse)

Spion Kop
Sire	Spearmint
Grandsire	Carbine
Dam	Hammerkop
Damsire	Gallinule
Sex	Stallion
Foaled	1917
Country	Ireland
Colour	Bay
Breeder	Giles Loder
Owner	Giles Loder
Trainer	Peter Gilpin
Record	14: 2-6-2
Earnings	£
Major wins
Epsom Derby (1920)

Spion Kop (1917–1941) was an Irish-bred, British-trained Thoroughbred racehorse and sire. In a career that lasted from 1919 until 1921, Spion Kop ran fourteen times winning two races. After an undistinguished early career in which he lost his first six races, he improved as a three-year-old to win the Epsom Derby in record time in 1920. After his retirement from racing he had some success as a stallion.

Spion Kop, a “strong, handsome” bay horse with a white blaze and four white socks, was bred by his owner Major Giles Loder who had inherited the Eyrefield Stud near Caragh in County Kildare from his uncle Eustace “Lucky” Loder in 1914. He was named after the Battle of Spion Kop (1900).

Spion Kop’s sire Spearmint had been Eustace Loder’s most successful horse winning the Derby and the Grand Prix de Paris in 1906. At stud, he was fairly successful, siring Royal Lancer (St Leger), Zionist (Irish Derby) and Plucky Liege. Hammerkop, Spion Kop’s dam was a top-class staying racehorse who won the Yorkshire Oaks in 1903 and the Cesarewitch Handicap in 1905, but produced no other winners in a long stud career.

Spion Kop was sent into training with Peter Gilpin at his Clarehaven Stables at Newmarket, Suffolk.

As the offspring of two slow-maturing stayers, Spion Kop was not expected to excel as a two-year-old in 1919. He failed to win in six starts, but showed some consistency by reaching the frame in all his races, finishing second five times and third once. At the end of the year, in the Free Handicap, a rating list of the leading juveniles, Spion Kop was given a weight of 102 pounds, suggesting that he was at least twenty pounds below top class.

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