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Champion jockey to bow out in a race named in his honour.
Damien Oliver's final race ride will be in a race carrying his name with the $1.5 million Gold Rush to be renamed the Damien Oliver Gold Rush.
The 1400-metre race will be run at Ascot in Oliver's native Western Australia on Saturday, December 9.
Oliver announced earlier this season that he would retire at the end of this year with the champion rider to compete at The Pinnacles series, which features the Railway Stakes, Winterbottom Stakes and Northerly Stakes, after the Melbourne Spring Carnival.
"Although it feels very odd to know there's now a definite last ride in my career, I'm hugely excited that it's going to be at Ascot, back where my story began so many years ago," Oliver said.
"It's a real honour to have The Gold Rush carry my name for 2023 and I'll be doing everything possible to go out on a winner."
Oliver has crafted one of the great careers in Australian racing and occupies a place in the Hall of Fame.
He has won 129 Group 1 races, including three Melbourne Cups, four Caulfield Cups, two Cox Plates and a Golden Slipper.
Oliver took up residence in Victoria in the late 1980s after starting his career in Western Australia.
Perth Racing chief executive James Oldring said the WA racing community was looking forward to paying tribute to a favourite son before he does hang up the saddle.
"Ollie's announcement that he will be concluding his career in Perth is an incredible early Christmas present for racing fans in WA, and we will certainly be pulling out all the stops to celebrate his record-breaking career throughout the carnival," Oldring said.
"Whilst his final ride in the $1.5m Damien Oliver Gold Rush will close off The Pinnacles in spectacular style, it's also wonderfully appropriate that Ollie's final Group 1 ride will be in the $1.5m Drummond Golf Northerly Stakes, given his association with Northerly and his famous Cox Plate victory way back in 2001."
