While three-year-old colts Fierceness and Sierra Leone traded punches at the top, three-year-old filly Thorpedo Anna stood above them both. The daughter of Fast Anna, a $40,000 yearling purchase, won six of seven starts.

Her lone loss came in the Travers when she took on the boys and pushed Fierceness to the brink.

Fierceness won the Travers. Thorpedo Anna made the Travers. She made the year, winning five Grade 1 stakes races, most likely earning Horse of the Year honours. And she’s coming back next year.

Tennessee Moon won her first race on January 6th and her 12th race on December 7th.

A $5,000 claim by owner/trainer Mark Hibdon, the dirt frontrunner won 12 races from 17 starts from Delta Downs to Energy Downs. That’s Louisiana to Wyoming (I had to Google it), 22 hours, 11 minutes by car.

Ken McPeek pulled off the impossible winning the Kentucky Oaks with Thorpedo Anna and the Kentucky Derby with Mystik Dan. That’s a career in a weekend.

The Kentucky-based trainer won 81 races and counting while engineering a nearly perfect season with Thorpedo Anna.

Chad Brown won the most money and Steve Asmussen won the most races, but McPeek’s 25 hours and 10 minutes of perfection in the Kentucky gloom won the year.

It’s hard to believe Godolphin could improve on a stellar 2023 season when Cody’s Wish provided wins on the track and tears in our eyes. Well, they raised the bar yet again with over $20 million in earnings.

With a focus on homebreds, Godolphin has become the force that it had always promised. Homebred two-year-olds Poster, Good Cheer, First Resort, Immersive, Sovereignty (the 2025 Kentucky Derby winner), East Avenue, and the passport-stamping arsenal of Charlie Appleby will keep Godolphin at the top.

The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority continued to split the sport.

Some players think it’s made a big difference, others think it’s created more harm than good.

Where’s the truth? Probably somewhere in the middle. The latest headline? Churchill Downs and the New York Racing Association file suit against HISA. Oh boy.

Perry Ouzts set the North American record as the oldest jockey to win a race. With 69 wins so far this year and 7,488 in his career, the 70-year-old jockey sits behind Russell Baze, Laffit Pincay Jr., Bill Shoemaker and Pat Day on the all-time wins list.

The Midwest-based jockey has ridden 53,427 races, second only to Baze. The hard way? Absolutely, Ouzts is 183rd on the all-time earnings list. Slowing down? Not yet, he’s winning at 24%, his best win rate of his 51-year career.

Flavien Prat led all jockeys with over $36 million in earnings and set a seasonal record with 80 stakes wins, including the Breeders’ Cup Classic with Sierra Leone and the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf with Moira.

Faultless and flawless on dirt and turf, the French-born jockey has certainly cleared a spot on his mantle for his first Eclipse Award.

Brian Hernandez Jr. etched and sketched a gem aboard Mystik Dan in the Kentucky Derby. The Cajun veteran broke from post three, slid over and took two positions to his inside, hammered his tent pole on the inside and stalked. They say he found a hole at the top of the stretch. Good jockeys find holes. Great jockeys make them.

Hernandez and Mystik Dan turned a sliver into a river. And that was the difference in the nose victory.

On top of that, Hernandez is a role model for every jockey in the world, winning the Mike Venezia Award for extraordinary sportsmanship and citizenship. Venezia, who died in a fall in 1988, would have liked Hernandez.

Announcer Travis Stone – part Mark Twain, part Vin Scully – strung together 20 horses and 10 furlongs of the Kentucky Derby and finished with a crescendo worthy of the race of the year. “…a wild finish…here’s the wire…photo finish…three noses on the wire…Mystik Dan, Sierra Leone and Forever Young…in an international thriller.”

The globe-trotting Rebel’s Romance touched down with another epic run in the Breeders’ Cup Turf.

I can still hear Charlie Appleby imploring the six-year-old gelding to his 15th career win. “Come on old man. Come on old man.” And then summing him up on the walk to the winner’s circle. “He’s some horse.” Yeah, some horse. Honorable mention to Carl Spackler, a two-time Grade 1 stakes winner during the year.

Senor Buscador, a homebred overachiever for Joe Peacock Jr., went on the road and captured the Grade 1 Saudi Cup back in February. The son of Mineshaft lost his next five but banked over $12 million on the year.

Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas upset the Preakness Stakes with Seize The Grey. The 89-year-old trainer won his first Preakness with Codex in 1980. Now, that’s a career. The key?

“I tell people if you have a passion for anything, you eliminate all the excuses. You’ll go without lunch, you’ll drive all night, you’ll go without sleep, you eliminate any excuse if you’ve got the passion.

“That’s what drives you but you need to get it and you need to find it. The biggest decision you’re ever going to make in your life is your attitude. You’ve got to make it early in the morning and make the right one. That’s the biggest one you’ll ever make.”

Snap Decision. The best horse without a championship – so far – surely will win his first when Eclipse Awards are announced in January.

The 10-year-old won a thriller over Galvin and High Definition in the American Grand National at Far Hills to lead all horses with $337,500.

His three wins helped Hall of Famer Jack Fisher tie with Leslie Young for the champion trainer title. Young’s third. Fisher’s 15th.

With 26 wins Graham Watters won his third championship in four years and shattered Gus Brown’s single season earnings record of $815,897 set in 2001.

From Co Meath, Watters became the 43rd jockey to ride 100 winners in the US. Led by Snap Decision, Watters’ horses earned $1,256,150. Jamie Bargary finished second with 17 wins and also surpassed Brown’s mark with $856,700.

“I sound like someone coming off the Mayflower back in the day. I came here without a penny in my pocket. I sold my car in England to pay for my visa.

“To go out this year and break a lot of records…the earnings record, three-time champion jockey, 100 winners in the U.S…My next goal is 200 winners and as many grade ones as I can.”

Goodbyes of the Year

Respected trainer Ben Cecil. Hall of Fame show rider turned trainer Rodney Jenkins.

The one and only Tepin. National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame chairman John Hendrickson. Runnymede’s 101-year-old scion Catesby Clay. Assistant trainer Toby Sheets. Owner and heart surgeon Mark DeDomenico.

Longtime Florida pinhooker Carl Bowling. Prominent sire Tale Of The Cat. Publisher and owner Peter Callahan.

Hall of Fame jockey Walter Blum. Unique announcer Larry Lederman. And so many other eclectic patches of the crazy quilt we call thoroughbred racing.