Last year was a hard year for jockeys. Then again, every year is a hard year for jockeys, so last year was no big deal unless you count the grim fact that one rider lost his life and a cluster of household names sustained injuries that read like the casualty report from a 10-car pileup.

Eclipse Award-winning photographer Barbara D. Livingston shares her favorite photos from 2018.

Although Keeneland will not resume racing until its spring meet opens in three months, the track indirectly provided handicappers with a horses-to-watch list from action this week at their January sale. That sale, which began Monday before wrapping up on Thursday, largely focused on the trade of broodmares and newly turned yearlings, but also included some racehorses, a group that drew my principal attention, knowing I could see these names in future past performances.

She’s a beer. She’s a postage stamp. She’s a bona-fide superstar and a national treasure. In this case, that nation is Australia.

Winx envy hit the world’s great racing stages hard last year. Dubai figured they had a race tailor-made for the marquee mare on World Cup Night. England’s Ascot pulled out all the stops trying to recruit her for its royal meet. Even the Breeders’ Cup sent serious feelers southward to encourage a possible autumn detour from her appointed rounds.

When it comes to winning graded stakes races, most owners and trainers are on the outside looking in. For better or worse, graded races are the metric by which success in Thoroughbred racing is measured. In 2018, Karl Broberg became only the third trainer to win more than 500 races in a single season, but none of them came in a graded stakes event. The Eclipse Award most likely will go to someone named Brown or Baffert.

A writer should be held accountable for what he/she writes. Unless, of course, you don’t count midnight rage tweets or messages in empty Boochcraft bottles.

In that spirit, a month-by-month tour of the 2018 inventory from this reporter seemed to be the best way to put the year in the rearview, while at the same time highlighting some ends left agonizingly loose.

Most of the attention across the country on Saturday will be focused on the 3-year-olds running in the Sham at Santa Anita and the Mucho Macho Man at Gulfstream Park. I’m interested in a couple of 3-year-old races, but they don’t happen to be those two. On the flip side, I think the San Gabriel for older horses in Southern California is wide open and could offer an opportunity for large payouts.

Limehouse

As post time for the fifth at Santa Anita Park approached on Wednesday’s opening-day card, a colleague perused the top of the program page and mumbled to no one in particular, “There are 11 different ways to bet this race.”

Santa Anita’s opening day is a tease. Its outsized gathering of great athletes and inspired fans elicits fond memories of an era long past, when weekends were filled with similar sights and weekdays held up their end of the bargain.

Nevermore, to be sure. But still, it felt good. The announced crowd of more than 41,000 – many of whom simply spun the ’stiles for the giveaway goodies – was entertained by 10 races that offered something for every taste.

Santa Anita Park was around for 50 years before Gary Stevens rode his first opening-day program on Dec. 26, 1984. With any luck, the grand track with the Ansel Adams backdrop will be around for at least a few more years now that Stevens has retired.