Twenty-seven. . . Twenty-four. . . Eighteen. . . Six. And eight.
The Maryland Hunt Cup wins by horses from the barn of trainer Joe Davies don't quite match the New York Yankees' World Series championships, the Montreal Canadiens' Stanley Cups, the Boston Celtics' NBA titles or even the Super Bowl triumphs of the New England Patriots and Pittsburgh Steelers in terms of sports history.
But, in the form of the horses who came through on the last Saturday of April for Davies and his team, the achievement stands tall among those other sports feats. None of it is lost on Davies, who collected his eighth victory in the historic timber race with Armata Stable's Mr. Fine Threads April 25.
"I didn't think I'd win one," Davies said, finding some perspective and watching the Maryland-bred cool out at Worthington Farms.
"It's a miracle, every time. There are so many things that can go wrong and every time I come over and look at the course I think, 'God, how does anybody jump around and overcome all the challenges there are in those 22
fences?' "
The 2026 version asked its questions with a field of nine, those 22 fences, 4 miles of Maryland turf (plus two mulchcovered road crossings), showers that arrived about an hour before post time and all the mystique and pressure a 132-year old race can produce.
Last year's winner Road to Oz and 2023 victor (and 2025 runner-up) Withoutmoreado (Ire) ruled most conversations beforehand, but the group contained multitudes. Shootist finished second, by a neck, in 2024. Making his fourth Hunt Cup start, Royal Ruse finished second in 2023. Monbeg Stream (Ire) set the pace in 2025 before settling for fourth.
Hunt Cup rookie Animal Kingston was fast enough to win five hurdle races. The Butler Yates (Ire) won the Genesee Valley Hunt Cup in 2025 and faced some of the circuit's best over timber. Great Road was a longshot, but represented Davies and came off a second in the Benjamin Murray Memorial at the Grand National.
Nobody showed up in better form than Mr. Fine Threads.
The 13-year-old closed 2025 with a confidence-building win at Willowdale in May and opened 2026 with a knockout punch in the Grand National timber stakes a week before the Hunt Cup. The son of Sightseeing brought some question marks too, mainly falls (at the third and 16th fences) in his only two Hunt Cup tries, but Davies did everything to put those behind the horse and out of mind.
With his son Teddy, who rode Mr. Fine Threads in the Grand National, committed to Withoutmoreado, Davies enlisted English amateur Charlie Marshall for the ride. Aboard Blackhall (Ire) for Davies, Marshall won the 2024 Hunt Cup and was fifth in 2025. More importantly, he brought loads of overseas point-to-point experience and had partnered with Mr. Fine Threads to that Willowdale win in 2025.
"Teddy had in February gotten offered to ride Withoutmoreado, who is a proven entity, so he took that," Davies said. "I thought I was a good idea, I endorsed it. After that, I always wanted Charlie to ride this horse in this race. He won on him at Willowdale, when Teddy was hurt. Having a really talented rider is one thing, but the connection is important too. I thought about a young rider, but he'd fallen twice before and I was a little nervous. If it goes wrong again, you'd kick yourself. I really thought Charlie would suit him."
Expected pacesetter Monbeg Stream and Paddy Barlow led to the first fence as the others sorted themselves behind him. Withoutmoreado drafted into second, just ahead of The Butler Yates and Royal Ruse. Road to Oz (Dan Nevin) found a stalking spot to the inside as Mr. Fine Threads drifted to eighth by the fifth fence. At the 4-foot-9 sixth, Withoutmoreado made a mistake while alongside the leader and fell.
Monbeg Stream carried on to the seventh, where jockey James Wyatt made a massive save when Royal Ruse landed steeply. Son of Hunt Cup-winning training Todd Wyatt and Hunt Cup-winning jockey Blair (Waterman) Wyatt, the Hunt Cup rookie lost both irons and nearly came off the left side before regaining his stirrups and rejoining the field where he left it in second.
A loose Withoutmoreado steamed through the field and added speed approaching the ninth fence. Monbeg Stream was sticky at the 10th, leaving Royal Ruse to lead over the 11th and 12th. Mr. Fine Threads jumped those two some 10 lengths behind, a comfortable seventh of eight alongside Shootist (Elizabeth Scully) and just in front of Great Road (Chloe Secor).
Marshall planned to stay back early.
"I just wanted to hold him up for as long as I could and get a lead for as long as I could," said the jockey. "He's fallen the last two times, at the third and the 16th; I had faith in his jumping. I was worried we were doing too much. When he's behind, he just switches off, which is fine, but then at some of the biggest fences I wanted him there underneath me. I like having the horse underneath me. You give him daylight here
because you want him to see the fences. But he can get too keen with too much daylight."
As usual, the 13th fence made its case. Wyatt made Royal Ruse find a stride and he outjumped Monbeg Stream and The Butler Yates (Virginia Korrell). Road to Oz hit the 4-foot-9 fence and fell. Mr. Fine Threads handled it and advanced to fourth. Royal Ruse led over 14, got passed by The Butler Yates before the 15th. Approaching the 16th, the largest fence on the course at 4-foot-10 and accented by an uphill approach, The Butler Yates led Monbeg Stream, Royal Ruse and Mr. Fine Threads. The winner jumped better than the others and advanced to second.
Monbeg Stream went back to the lead over 17, but Mr. Fine Threads again outjumped everybody at the 18th to land with a 2-length lead. He flew the 19th, where Animal Kingston made a mistake and almost lost Eric Poretz while second. Landing there, Shootist and Elizabeth Scully revved up and passed four horses to get to second before the 20th fence.
A little bit of a trap with its downhill approach after a lefthand turn, the 3-foot-9 board fence nearly undid Mr. Fine Threads. Marshall asked for a big stride, Mr. Fine Threads chipped in and left from a short spot as Shootist landed running and shot past on the inside.
The Todd McKenna trainee led across Tufton Avenue, but Mr. Fine Threads answered and they met the 21st -- the smallest fence on the course at 2-foot-11 and leaning over a small brook on the landing side -- on even terms. Mr. Fine Threads rebuilt a slim lead before the last, Shootist replied with one more try but was no match in the stretch as Mr. Fine Threads pulled away to win by 6 lengths in 8:43.60.
Twenty lengths back, Royal Ruse stayed for third followed by Animal Kingston, Great Road, The Butler Yates and Monbeg Stream. The only non-finishers were the previous winners Road to Oz and Withoutmoreado.
For a moment, Marshall worried that he'd lost the race with the miscue at the 20th.
"He put down at one of the smallest fences on the course," Marshall said. "I landed on his ears, got back into the play and
he had loads of running left."
Twice a Hunt Cup winner in three tries, Marshall loved the original opportunity to ride the race -- first run in 1894 and a steeplechase marvel even on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.
"I knew a lot about it, but I never realized what it was like until I got here," Marshall said. "You can't explain it to anyone until you've actually been here -- how prestigious it is to the people and how much it means to the people that are here and how welcoming everyone is about it. When Joe said to come and stay, bring your family -- my dad and my wife came out. The first time -- it's a special thing, and they really mean it. You don't know any of that until you get here."
Marshall's wife missed the 2026 race as she stayed home to care for their son Otto, born 18 days before.
"We didn't plan it around this, but my wife Hannah is amazing," said Marshall. "She said, 'I've got it. You go. I'll stay at home.' She's my biggest fan. She'll be thrilled." The Hunt Cup win was the fourth for Armata's cherry red and gold silks -- following Welter Weight in 1999 and Vintage Vinnie (Ire) in 2021 and 2022. The eighth challenge cup, which can be retired with three wins by an owner and was put into circulation in 2021, remains in play as the Armata ownership list changed after the death of original partner Perry Bolton in January 2025.
Bolton would have loved Mr. Fine Threads' big moment. Bred by William Harris, a leading owner and breeder of flat horses in Maryland for decades, Mr. Fine Threads never raced on the flat. He was foaled in 2013, the year Harris died, and sold as a yearling to steeplechase owner Sharon Sheppard. The late-developing gelding made his racing debut at age 5 at the Elkridge-Harford Point-to-Point, moving from Billy Santoro and Alicia Murphy to Davies as a 10-year-old maiden in 2022. Like prior trainers, Davies has battled hoof issues. After getting front shoes nailed on, Mr. Fine Threads would be lame for days. At first Davies considered glue-on shoes, then opted to leave the horse without front shoes for the better part of two years based on farrier David Belt's advice that no shoes might help the horse more over time than the glue-ons.
"He said to leave him barefoot, but not just leave him barefoot, exercise him, even though he's a little bit sore, exercise the heck out of him," said Davies of the decision in early 2023. "In the middle of the summer, if you take the shoes off them and they're stomping flies and things, that's different. It was early spring, maybe February. We must marched him and he got sounder and sounder."
Glue-on shoe specialist David Landolfi eventually called to check in, and Davies said Mr. Fine Threads was "pretty sound" without front shoes. Landolfi said to stick with the plan. Mr. Fine Threads trained and raced without front shoes -- losing to a horse named Stolen Shoes (Ire) in 2023 just for the irony. The long-striding bay won four races (counting point-to-points) without front shoes in 2023 and 2024. He also fell twice, including a slip at the third fence of the 2024 Hunt Cup.
"Before, he had the most awful-looking, bruised, contracted foot," said Davies, pulling up a photo on his phone. "Sunken heels, all pink and bruised. A year later, his foot was two sizes bigger."
And healthier. The bruising was gone. The heels were higher. Davies went to front shoes last year and again before this timber season because he wanted to foxhunt him while aiming for big jumping tests in the Grand National and Hunt Cup. Mr. Fine Threads won both.
"He's a lovely foxhunter and hunter-trial horse," said Davies. "Everybody rides him. He's a lovely, lovely horse." The earliest Hunt Cup history doesn't record trainers and for much of it horses were ridden (and no doubt trained) by their owners. Davies' eight wins top the six of Janon Fisher Jr. (triples by Blockade and Mountain Dew) and Charlie Fenwick (two by *Ben Nevis II and Buck Jakes, one each by *Dosdi and Sugar Bee). Jill Fanning and Ann Stewart won four each, as did Billy Meister.
Davies rode his first Hunt Cup in 1990, but didn't win as a jockey until 1998. He added victories in 2000 and 2005. His training days didn't go much better at first -- the first four runners in his name failed to finish -- but turned a corner in 2016. Senior Senator won that year and repeated in 2018 and 2019.
Even when that Hunt Cup dynamo fell, in 2017, the Daviestrained Derwins Prospector won. Vintage Vinnie scored in 2021 and 2022. Blackhall triumphed in 2024.
That's eight wins in 10 runnings, with the 2020 race canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but Davies points out that he works at it.
"I don't think any other trainer focuses on it like I do," he said. "I'm not interested in horses to run at Camden or down south somewhere. Other trainers all have much more diverse barns and they're running horses at other meets, at Colonial Downs, over hurdles, on the flat. I made a decision probably 15 or 20 years ago that I only wanted to focus on Maryland timber horses."
That means plenty of wins, but more than enough disappointment too. Davies horses have started 28 times in the Maryland Hunt Cup. The eight wins get offset by 14 runners who didn't finish. Therein lies the challenge.
"A good horse can do it so effortlessly, OK not effortlessly, but they can make it look effortless and can come back well and eat up that night and bounce out of it successfully," Davies said. "Every fence has a history and a nuance; it's the only course that has not been altered really in the last 100 years. It's the ultimate test, I think, of a Thoroughbred."
Mr. Fine Threads got an A.
