Owing to a promising 2-year-old campaign in which he finished second in the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes in his second and final start, much was expected from Code of Honor coming into his 3-year-old year. So when he belly flopped in his 2019 debut in the Mucho Macho Man, finishing fourth of six at 4-5, questions understandably were raised about whether he had progressed from 2 to 3.

Omaha Beach was one of the best 3-year-olds in the land in the spring, when he won the Arkansas Derby and wound up as the morning-line favorite for the Kentucky Derby, and in the fall, when he returned from a layoff of nearly six months to win a Grade 1 sprint, and in the winter, when he won yet another Grade 1 race. He began the racing year in January and ended it in December, overcoming several twists and turns along the way, with his talent and the skill of his Hall of Fame trainer, Richard Mandella, winning out more often than not.

Serengeti Empress danced many of the major dances for fillies in 2019 – and, on the day of her division’s signature race, she was the queen.

Storm the Court has been a longshot in all of his races. But given how he performed in two of them, he is the likely favorite to win the Eclipse Award as champion 2-year-old male.

Guarana’s campaign was brief, but dazzling. From April to September, the filly made four starts, winning a pair of Grade 1 events, and posting Beyer Speed Figures of 90 or higher in each outing. She shone bright enough to be voted a finalist for the Eclipse Award as the nation’s outstanding 3-year-old filly.

Guarana, a daughter of 2004 Horse of the Year Ghostzapper, races as a homebred for Three Chimneys Farm. The filly was, appropriately enough, turned over to trainer Chad Brown, who worked with Ghostzapper as an assistant to the late Hall of Fame trainer Bobby Frankel.

Lightning struck twice for Graham Motion when Sharing upset the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf last fall.

Motion also trained the filly’s dam, Shared Account, to win the 2010 BC Filly and Mare at 46-1.

“I’m so appreciative of this filly,” Motion said after Sharing surged to a 1 1/4-length triumph at 13-1 in the Juvenile Fillies Turf at Santa Anita. “Shared Account meant so much to me.”

Sharing was named a finalist for the Eclipse Award for 2-year-old filly of 2019.

As a $40,000 yearling purchase, British Idiom was eligible for a restricted maiden race at Saratoga last summer. Hardly anyone could have foretold that winning that six-furlong debut would propel her to back-to-back Grade 1 victories and a most likely divisional championship in just two more starts.

Indeed, trainer Brad Cox was among those pleasantly surprised and elated with the rapid progress made afterward by the modestly bred filly.

“Every time we asked her to step up, she did,” said Cox.

It’s not often you see a horse whose three career victories all came in Grade 1 races.

But that’s the remarkable 2019 record compiled as a 2-year-old by Bast, a handy bay filly who capped her season by giving her Hall of Fame trainer, Bob Baffert, his sixth victory in the Grade 1 Starlet Stakes.

Kazushi Kimura led all North American-based apprentice jockeys in mount earnings in 2019 and for his memorable season is an Eclipse Award finalist. He won 117 races and reached $3.7 million in mount earnings from Jan. 1 through the final date of his apprentice allowance, Oct. 26.

Calumet Farm is seeking just its second title in the modern Eclipse Awards era, which began in 1971, and its first under the stewardship of Brad Kelley.