Blast From The Past: Lincoln Handicap

Favourite backers got off to a good start on Lincoln day in 1968 (the race was then run on a Wednesday), with the first two races both going to the ‘jolly’. The opening selling handicap for three-year-olds over seven furlongs went to a before-he-was-famous Red Rum, but finding the winner of the 31-runner Lincoln itself looked to be a stiffer task, with the Lester Piggott-ridden Irish challenger Bluerullah sent off the 10/1 favourite.

However, it was the top-weight Frankincense who prevailed at 100/8, a performance which earned him the rare distinction for a Lincoln winner of an essay in Racehorses, though his win was covered in just a few lines:

‘Frankincense put up a magnificent performance to win the Lincoln under 9-5, and there were few, if any, better four-year-old milers in the country in 1968. It was his fine turn of foot which won him the race. Pinging into the lead entering the last furlong, he kept on very gamely to win by half a length from Waterloo Place.’

His essay went on to point out that only four other horses had carried nine stone or more to victory in the Lincoln in the last hundred years, while we can add now that only two winners, Cataldi (1985) and Babodana (2004), have carried more weight since. Both of those won under 9-10, Cataldi ridden by Greville Starkey who had also partnered Frankincense.

The Lady Halifax-owned Frankincense was trained by John Oxley at Newmarket, though his win proved instrumental in getting the career of another trainer off the ground. Barry Hills was travelling head lad to Oxley at the time and played his part in a huge gamble on the horse which won him enough money to purchase a yard of his own, hence the title of Robin Oakley’s biography of Hills, Frankincense and More.   

Oxley trained another Lincoln entry, Copper’s Evidence, and it was when Frankincense started beating him on the gallops that Hills and his associates began backing the latter:

‘Copper’s Evidence was a pretty good horse – he eventually finished fifth in the race – but I went out and started backing Frankincense at 66/1. We backed him from 66/1 to 5/1 favourite, though he drifted back on the day. He was a certainty. He worked on Side Hill in Newmarket one day and beat the others out of sight. You didn’t need to see any more. We toured round bookmakers’ shops putting small bets on everywhere.’

Frankincense was a smart colt (rated 118) and though he didn’t win again after the Lincoln, he kept very good company, including when second in the Queen Anne Stakes, fourth in the Eclipse (taking on two Derby winners, Royal Palace and Sir Ivor) and third in the Sussex Stakes.

Barry Hills retired (for a second time) in 2015 after a training career which brought him an Arc de Triomphe with Rheingold and a number of classic victories, though fittingly his cv also includes a win in the Lincoln in 2003 with Pablo, ridden by his son Michael.