Equus Awards tonight

Not so sure I agree with the horse of the year award. Fair enough PP has done the trebble (queens plate and Met), but that is a life time achievement award not horse of the year. When Dynasty won horse of the year, he did exactly what BCL did, BCL also won the Derby which Dynasty missed out on... BCL and PP both one 3 Gr1 races - surely the July has to carry the most weight... Feel sorry for the BCL connections, but I reckon his year is next year.

Why this obsession with the July "carrying more weight?" On the basis of what? You have Pocket Power winning a true run Met with top weight and BCL winning a very false-run July with a light weight.

Furthermore, Pocket Power achieved two things (not just one) during the course of the season that had never been achieved before. Who can say whether Dynasty would have been horse of the year if a rival had achieved something similar in his year? To say that BCL should have been horse of the year because he won the same races as horse of the year Dynasty is absurd. You have to look at both seasons' overall results and weigh up what other options there may have been.

BCL is a fine horse, but he has never yet made history. PP did it twice during the season in question, and for good measure he slammed BCL the only time they met at Weight For Age (or "equal") terms. What more do you need?

Mr. Magiclips,

I couldn't agree with you more. All PP's efforts this year where top drawer, even the defeat "heard around the world" in the July. Nobody actually takes weight, structure and times of these races into account.

BCL is a good horse but he has not quite matched the accomplishments that PP has. This is not to say that he won't at some point.

Let us hopefully see PP and BCL race at Kenilworth in both the Queens plate and Met in handicaps and then all this controversy can be put to rest.

Molly must get another award..the best I've seen him ever...

In the real world (England, France and Ireland), Champions are not voted on. The Champions recognized in sales catalogues throughout the civilized world are those weighted at the top of their respective divisions.

The difference between Musir and Villandry on a handicap woudl greatly favor the former, probably by a great margin.

The Champion should be the best horse, not the one with the best rounded record.

For what it's worth; Musir has an 'official' MR of 108 and Villandry 105 (according to the ratings on the NHA); so therefor Musir is the 'better' horse

desert links mr 105 mokaro mr 101? links wins Gold Cup in 2 seconds faster time in the calendar year of the award 2008/2009. runs fifth in July. Not sure if I agree with Mokaro getting the award for champ stayer

The way Mokaro won the J & B Reserve Stayers by half the racecourse was the clincher, one imagines. Desert Links was never seen in SA again, which of course is not his fault but which had to impact on the voting.

The difference for me is that the one is a Gr1 the other a Gr 2 - The Gr1 is at the end of the season with the best stayers around at the time(the J&B often has some weak fields to be fair) so perhaps Mokaro should have won the award for 2010 - if there are no top stayers to emerge during the season he could win the award again in 2010 as the gold cup(2009) was included in deciding this award.(the irony of the situation is that MOKARO has been one of my favorite runners since he started out and I never once had a bet on Desert Links but I really do think the panel erred with this one)

Last I checked, the season runs from 1 August to 31 July, so I can't understand why the decision was made to include the Gold Cup run on the 1st of August as part of the previous season's stats; imo this leads to confusion and to questions why Karis Teetan's winners on the 1st of August did then not count towards the appy title. So I agree with Mr H, Mokaro's win in the 2009 Gold Cup should in fairness not have been taken into account (but should count when judging next year's award), and Desert Links should have been the clear winner for the season past imo.

So what do they do for the 2009/2010 season for the stayers as theoretically Mokaro has 1/2 a hold on the award already....or will they change the rules again?

did mother russias group 2 win on the same card count for old or new season