Minting was one of a small group of exceptional horses whose careers coincided in the 1880s. In 1885 The Bard was undefeated in 16 races as a juvenile. Ormonde (qv) only ran three times, all in the autumn, but his performances marked him as above average. Minting, trained at Heath House by Matt Dawson, won each of his five races. The trio were all strongly fancied for next year’s classics. In the 2,000 Guineas Minting gave best to Ormonde, the pair ten lengths clear. Doubting that revenge could be obtained in the Derby, connections decided to run Minting in the Grand Prix de Paris, the most valuable race in France. He won easily, beating the Oaks winner and the dead-heaters for the Prix du Jockey Club. Injury prevented him from running again that year.
Minting reappeared as a four-year-old at Ascot, winning the first – a handicap – easily and then being beaten a neck by his nemesis Ormonde in the Hardwicke Stakes. He didn’t run again that year, nor was he packed off to stud. On 12 May 1888 he won the second running of Kempton’s Jubilee Handicap (qv) “in a canter” with ten stone, giving 44 and 48 pounds to the second and third, earning 3,000 guineas in the process. He duly saw off his solitary rival in the Hardwicke but ended his turf career with an anticlimax, finishing second in the Champion Stakes.
Minting’s form figures were 11111/21/12/112. He was named after the village in Lincolnshire where his owner, Robert Charles de Grey Vyner, lived.
His performance at Kempton was staggering enough to justify naming a race after him, but there was none before the Minting Stakes for two-year-olds on 12 May 1934. It was a run-of-the-mill mile and a half handicap by the Saturday of the May Day holiday weekend of 1982, when it was run for the last time.