photo by: Benoit & Associates

For a fleeting moment in 2012, the filly and mare world seemed to belong to Include Me Out.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

There were moments during 2012 when a filly named Contested seemed untouchable.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

Darley Stud, owned by Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed al-Maktoum, led all breeders in American graded stakes wins last year. Nine Darley-breds won 15 graded races during the season.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

If not for a nose defeat in her final start of the year, the Grade 1 Cigar Mile in late November, Groupie Doll might well have been a candidate for Horse of the Year. Yes, her 2012 was that good.

photo by: Tom Keyser

No apprentice jockey in North America jockey racked up more mount earnings in 2012 than Angel Suarez, who regularly rode day and night cards in Pennsylvania to amass $3,366,126.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

Irad Ortiz Jr. completed his apprenticeship on Feb. 1, 2012, finishing off a freshman year of riding during which he won 98 races and had mount earnings of $3,318,303.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

How many 2012 Eclipse Award finalists didn’t win a stakes? Don’t look, there’s only one.

Steeplechaser Divine Fortune put together one of the best, if most confounding, campaigns in recent memory – without winning a single stakes.

photo by: Shigeki Kikkawa

There were seven Grade 1 events on the main track in 2012 for 2-year-old fillies. Only one filly was able to win more than one of them.

photo by: Barbara D. Livingston

From his base at Airdrie Stud in Kentucky, Brereton C. Jones made a strong mark on graded racing in North America last year, thanks in large part to his homebreds.

photo by: Shigeki Kikkawa

In 2012, Frank Stronach’s Adena Springs operation compounded its record as the decade’s dominant breeder by earnings.