Colonial Downs to host inaugural ‘Boston Stakes’ in honor of famed Henrico horse

The nine-week summer horse racing season at Colonial Downs will get underway July 11 and will feature the inaugural Boston Stakes, honoring a famed Henrico racehorse. The season will run through Saturday, Sept. 7, with racing every Thursday through Saturday.

The racehorse Boston, who was foaled in Henrico and lived from 1833 to 1850, was America’s most accomplished racehorse in an era when thoroughbred racing was the nation’s most popular sport. Boston won 40 of 45 known races between 1836 and 1943 on tracks from Georgia to New York, once in front of a crowd of 70,000. Later a renowned sire, he was an inaugural inductee into the National Museum of Racing’s Hall of Fame in 1955.

The Boston Stakes will take place Saturday, July 13 and will be a one-mile race, a prep for the Grae 2 Secretariat Stakes, which will run later in the season.

Boston was a grandson of Sir Archy and was a regal chestnut-colored horse with a white blaze on his nose. During his racing career, he was undefeated as a 4 and 5-year-old starting in 15 races. Thirty of Boston’s victories were in four-mile heats and nine were in three-milers.

Thirteen of the horse’s starts took place in Virginia, including eight in Petersburg – all of which he won. Post-racing, Boston was the leading sire in 1851, 1852 and 1853 and eventually sired 95 winners of 293 races. Among his noted progeny were Lexington and Lecomte.

To celebrate his importance to Virginia racing, the County of Henrico will dedicate a new historical marker at Boston’s foaling location this summer, soon after the inaugural Boston Stakes at Colonial.