Perfect Zenalie

The road to the 2010 Horse of the Year honors will go down as one of the most heated battles ever. On one side, you have the blueblood bred Blame who won 3 G1's including the BC Classic. On the other side, you have the bluecollar bred Zenyatta who won 5 G1's was runner up in the Classic. Most people assumed that the 3 time Older Female Champ would come just a bit short for the third year in a row for the highest accolade of the night. However, it turned out that they where wrong.



Zenyatta becomes the third Female this century to win Horse of the Year honors behind Azeri and Rachel Alexandra. She also becomes the third HOY to win the award the year after winning the Classic (Cigar who lost in his defence of the Classic, but had won HOY the year before as well and Skip Away who lost HOY in 97 to Favorite Trick, but won HOY in 98 after losing the Classic to Awesome Again). Blame was a very close second, while Goldikova got more votes then people expected she would finishing in third.

While people are dispointed and upset with Blame not winning HOY, in a way it maybe a good thing he did not win. Since 1990 only 8 horses who won the Classic, have gone onto win Horse of the Year honors. Those that are left:

1990- Criminal Type (did not participate)
1993- Kotashaan (won the Turf)
1994- Holy Bull (did not participate)
1996- Cigar (3rd in the Classic)
1997- Favorite Trick (won the Juvenile)
1998- Skip Away (6th in the Classic)
1999- Charismatic (did not participate)
2001- Point Given (did not participate)
2002- Azeri (f) (Won the Distaff)
2008- Curlin (4th Classic)
2009- Rachel Alexandra (f) (did not participate)
2010- Zenyatta (f) (2nd in the Classic)

Now in Charismatic and Point Given's defence, both suffered career ending injuries. Still they did not take part in the BC their respective years. That doesn't mean Blame didn't deserve HOY, he absolutly did. But it's just a title, the horse's themselves don't care about it. In a way, too much pressure is put on the horse. Should Blame's fans be dispointed? Tt really depends on who you talk to. Him not getting Horse of the Year is not going to deminish the fact that he defeated Z on the track where it counts. His trainer Al Stall was gracious in defeat which is different from last year when Jerry & Ann Moss post awards show basically threw Rachel under the bus.

Valerie of Foolish Pleasure and Fillies First put together a nice list of Champion Females from around the world from this past year.

As for the other awards of the night:

2yo Champions: No suprise that Awesome Feather and Uncle Mo took them. Both deserved them off their wins in the BC.

3yo Champions: Again no suprise that Blind Luck (one vote away from being unanimous which I found suprising) and Lookin at Lucky won. Shame Lucky has been retired, and "Clover's" 4yo didn't start out as expected.

Older Champions: Suprised that Blame was unanimous, you would think Zenyatta would be? Nope. At least this year it was Goldikova and not some random horse like Icon Project that got the vote.

Sprinters: Not suprised by Dubai Majesty, but Big Drama was a little bit of suprise at least for me it was.

Turf: Gio Ponti was a bit of a suprise, I felt that Winchester should have won since he did defeat him. However, that was seemed to be the tone of the night. Goldi won for the Females which was no suprise at all.

Steeplechase: Slip Away which is also no suprise.

In all it was basically chalky last night. Personally I'm glad that it's finally over, Z has ridden into the sunset the ultimate champion and we can now focus on horses that will be running this year.

At least until November comes around.