Justify's Belmont win named NTRA Moment of the Year
Voters overwhelmingly chose the Belmont Stakes win by undefeated Justify as the 2018 Moment of the Year, according to the administrator of the contest, the National Thoroughbred Racing Association.
The Belmont win, which made Justify the 13th Triple Crown winner in U.S. racing history, was tabbed by 829 voters as the Moment of the Year among 11 other options. The NTRA received a total of 2,260 responses in the voting, which was tallied through Twitter likes and an online poll. Votes were limited to one per Twitter account.
The second-place choice in the contest, a win by the handicap horse Diversify in the Whitney Stakes, received 372 votes. The Whitney was the last win by Diversify while being trained by Rick Violette, who died in October. The win by European super filly Enable in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf was third with 300.
Last year, voters selected the racing and equine community’s response to a fire that swept through the San Luis Rey Downs training center in Southern California as the Moment of the Year, with a 25 percent plurality of the 3,303 votes cast.
The NTRA inaugurated the Moment of the Year contest in 1999.
