After a one-year absence from the podium, Southern California-based horses could win anywhere from three to five Eclipse Awards on Thursday when Thoroughbred racing’s champions for 2024 are announced at a black-tie ceremony held at the Breakers Palm Beach, a resort in South Florida. Heading the list of likely Southern California-based runners to be honored are Citizen Bull in the 2-year-old male division; National Treasure, for older dirt male in a category where all three finalists were Southern California-based; and Straight No Chaser, a finalist for both male sprinter and older dirt male. Two other strong California contenders for Eclipse Awards are Johannes (male turf) and Adare Manor (older dirt female). For 2023, only two Southern California-based horses even made it as finalists. In 2022, the Southern California-based Flightline was Horse of the Year and older dirt male champion. The three finalists in 11 equine divisions and six human categories for the 2024 season were announced on Jan. 5 following a compilation of votes from three voting blocs – Daily Racing Form, the National Turf Writers and Broadcasters Association, and the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, which consists of racing officials and Equibase field personnel. :: Play Gulfstream Park with confidence! DRF Past Performances, Picks, and Clocker Reports available now. A total of 208 ballots from among 240 eligible voters were returned. Though finalists were determined by voters selecting three horses or people in each category, champions are determined solely on first-place votes. Horse of the Year will be announced as the final award. The finalists for Horse of the Year will be announced throughout Thursday’s ceremony, which will be hosted by sports broadcast journalists Britney Eurton and Lindsay Czarniak and televised live on FanDuel TV beginning at 6:30 p.m. Eastern with a red-carpet show. The awards ceremony is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. and will be streamed on multiple platforms, including DRF.com. Caton Bredar will again serve as the announcer. Thorpedo Anna, the five-time Grade 1-winning filly who should be a unanimous choice in the 3-year-old filly division, is considered the leading contender for Horse of the Year, which would make her the seventh female to win the award since 1983. The other two finalists for Horse of the Year could be Sierra Leone and Fierceness, who are vying for the 3-year-old male championship in what could be one of the closer-contested categories of the evening. Sierra Leone defeated Fierceness in the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, making for a two-two split in decisions from the four times they met. Dornoch, the two-time Grade 1 winner, is the other 3-year-old male finalist. Another close category figures to be the older dirt female division where Idiomatic, last year’s champion in this category, is up against Adare Manor. Both females won two Grade 1 stakes in 2024 and had another graded stakes victory on their résumé. Adare Manor did not race after August. Raging Sea, who defeated Idiomatic in the Personal Ensign at Saratoga, is the other finalist. National Treasure, on the strength of Grade 1 victories in the Metropolitan Handicap and Pegasus World Cup, rates the edge in the older dirt male division. The other finalists are Full Serrano, the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner, and Straight No Chaser, the Breeders’ Cup Sprint winner. :: Santa Anita Clocker Reports are available every race day. Access now. Straight No Chaser, who raced only three times in 2024 – winning twice – is the likely male sprint champion unless voters went outside the box with the super-fast turf sprinter Cogburn, who won three stakes from four starts. The Chosen Vron – yet another Southern California-based horse – won five of six starts, including the Grade 1 Bing Crosby, and is the other finalist. Soul of an Angel, the upset winner of the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint, is the favorite to win female sprinter of the year in a category that includes Ways and Means and Society, Grade 1 winners whom Soul of the Angel defeated in the Breeders’ Cup. Though Johannes was beaten three-quarters of a length when second to More Than Looks in the Breeders’ Cup Mile, he won five other graded stakes, including the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile. His competition in the male turf division includes Rebel’s Romance, whose lone North American win was the Breeders’ Cup Turf, and Carl Spackler, a two-time Grade 1 winner who finished sixth in the BC Mile. Moira, the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf winner, is the likely winner of the female turf championship, a division whose other finalists are the 3-year-old fillies Cinderella’s Dream and She Feels Pretty. Those two fillies are also finalists in the 3-year-old filly division with Thorpedo Anna. Citizen Bull, a two-time Grade 1 winner who won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, and Immersive, a three-time Grade 1 winner who took the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, are the expected champions in the 2-year-old male and female divisions, respectively. Snap Decision is the likely winner of steeplechase Eclipse Award. On the human side, Flavien Prat, who set single-year records for graded stakes wins (56) and stakes victories (82) and led all North American jockeys in purse-money won, is expected to dethrone four-time Eclipse Award winner Irad Ortiz Jr. as outstanding jockey. Tyler Gaffalione is the other finalist. The trainer award figures to come down to Chad Brown or Kenny McPeek. Brown, a four-time Eclipse champion, had the best overall year, highlighted by winning 15 Grade 1 stakes with 12 individual horses and leading all trainers in earnings and graded stakes wins. McPeek achieved the rare accomplishment of winning the Kentucky Derby (Mystik Dan) and Kentucky Oaks (Thorpedo Anna) in the same year – something that hadn’t been done in 72 years. Brad Cox is the other finalist in this category. :: Subscribe to the DRF Post Time Email Newsletter: Get the news you need to play today's races!  Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum’s Godolphin LLC is looking to sweep the outstanding owner and breeder categories for a fourth consecutive year. Godolphin campaigned 22 North American graded stakes winners and set a record for earnings with $20.2 million. Erik Asmussen, son of Hall of Fame trainer and multiple Eclipse Award-winning trainer Steve Asmussen, heads the list of finalists for apprentice jockey, which also includes Gabriel Maldonado and J.G. Torrealba. Mike Gillum, winner of the National Horseplayers Championship in March, will be honored with the Eclipse Award as Horseplayer of the Year. Also recognized at Thursday’s ceremony will be the previously announced winners of the media Eclipse Awards – Sean Clancy (writing, news-enterprise), Chris McGrath (writing, feature-commentary), Scott Serio (photography), NBC Sports (live television programming, and Sue Finley (multimedia). Frank Taylor is being recognized with a Special Eclipse Award. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.