Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders name award winners

The Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders has unveiled its statebred champions and associated merit award winners, led by Broodmare of the Year Beyond the Waves, via press release. The award winners are typically revealed at a luncheon in April at Keeneland, which has been postponed until the fall due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Beyond the Waves, a French stakes winner, was co-bred and campaigned by George Strawbridge Jr., who continues to add to his trophy case with this family. Her son Bricks and Mortar was honored as the 2019 Horse of the Year and Eclipse Award champion male turf horse, and gave Strawbridge his first Eclipse as outstanding breeder. Bricks and Mortar, a five-time Grade 1 winner last season, also has been honored as Kentucky's Horse of the Year and outstanding male turf horse.

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Beyond the Waves is the dam of seven winners from as many starters, also including Grade 3 winner Emerald Beech, stakes winner Beyond Smart, stakes-winning steeplechaser Beyond Henry, and two stakes-placed horses.

The other Kentucky-bred champion runners for 2019 are Storm the Court (2-year-old male), British Idiom (2-year-old female), Maximum Security (3-year-old male), Covfefe (3-year-old female, female sprinter), Vino Rosso (older dirt male), Midnight Bisou (older dirt female), Got Stormy (turf female), Mitole (male sprinter), and Siskin (racing abroad). All of those except for Got Stormy and Siskin, who has no equivalent category, also earned divisional Eclipse Awards. The female turf Eclipse went to Uni, bred in Great Britain.

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The P.A.B. Widener Trophy for KTOB Breeder of the Year was earned by Calumet Farm, while the Hardboot Breeders’ Award, recognizing a distinctive but unsung breeder, will go to Alfred Nuckols Jr. In the state's other merit awards, Natalie Voss of the Paulick Report will be recognized with the Charles W. Engelhard Award, acknowledging outstanding media coverage. The William T. Young Humanitarian Award, recognizing a person or organization in the Thoroughbred industry "who recognizes and promotes the human endeavor," will be presented to the Edward P. Evans Foundation.

Also to receive awards at the postponed luncheon will be the leading Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund money earners in 2019 in five categories, with the honorees being Into Mischief (Sire of the Year), Zulu Alpha (Earner of the Year), G. Watts Humphrey, Jr. (Owner of the Year), Steve Asmussen (Trainer of the Year), and Calumet Farm (Breeder of the Year).