This year’s Shergar Cup will be held at Ascot Racecourse on Saturday 10th August. Come and enjoy this unique team competition where some of the best jockeys in the world will battle against each other in a thrilling six-race showdown.

There will be an array of fun activities to keep the whole family entertained, from fairground rides to urban display workshops, and after racing there will be a concert boasting some of Britain's favourite music acts. Racegoers can look forward to singing along to Atomic Kitten, Blue, D:Ream, Go West and Rick Astley, who are all continuing recent comebacks, while Bjorn Again completes an exciting line-up.

The idea for the Shergar Cup is borrowed from golf’s Ryder Cup, where the jockeys compete in teams. It was first held in 1999 at Goodwood Racecourse, but has been hosted at Ascot since 2000. There will be four teams consisting of Great Britain and Ireland, Europe, the Rest of the World, and the Girls team. Each team has 3 jockeys, who will each ride in five of the six races and receive points for his/her team according to the position they finish in.

There has been a Japanese jockey competing in every Shergar Cup since 2000, and this year top jockey Mr Yasunari Iwata will be riding for the Rest of the World team. He won the Japan Racing Association prize for most victories in both 2011 and 2012. He has also had success abroad, such as winning the Melbourne Cup in 2006, and the Hong Kong Sprint in 2012. He also rode the Japanese Derby winner, Deep Brillante, at Ascot in last year’s King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes. As of 7th July, he has won 1,018 JRA races, 59 Group races (20 of these being Group 1 race wins), and is currently in fourth position, just four wins away from becoming this year’s leading jockey in Japan.

Japan Racing Association, London Representative Office