2017 Kentucky Derby 2017 Kentucky Derby The 2017 Kentucky Derby (in full, the Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands, due to sponsorship) was the 143rd running of the Kentucky Derby, and took place on Saturday, May 6, 2017. The Kentucky Derby is a horse race held each year in Louisville, Kentucky, on the first Saturday in May, at the end of the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. It is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old Thoroughbreds at a distance of , and has been run at Churchill Downs racetrack since its inception in 1875. The race was broadcast by NBC with a scheduled
American Quarter Horse resulting horse was small, hardy, and quick, and was used as a work horse during the week and a race horse on the weekends. As flat racing became popular with the colonists, the Quarter Horse gained even more popularity as a sprinter over courses that, by necessity, were shorter than the classic racecourses of England, and were often no more than a straight stretch of road or flat piece of open land. When matched against a Thoroughbred, local sprinters often won. As the Thoroughbred breed became established in America, many colonial Quarter Horses were included in the original American stud