The horse of the year followed up with victory in the one mile Queen Elizabeth II Stakes at Ascot. Roaring Lion beat fellow stablemate Enable to also secure the top three-year-old colt honour. Enable, who won the Breeders’ Cup Turf and the second Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, picked up the older horse award.
It was a golden night for Gosden who saw his fourth horse in five years win the Horse of the Year award in European Flat racing’s end of season awards. He has led Kingman (2014), Golden Horn (2015), and last year’s winner Enable to the same fate.
John Gosden’s Enable narrowly missed out on becoming the third horse to win the award twice and just the second to win consecutive awards after Frankel (2011 and 2012) and Ouija Board (2004 and 2006). The only other trainer to achieve the same five equine Cartier Racing Awards in a year has been Aidan O’Brien in 2016 when Churchill, Minding, Order of St George and Found mopped up for him. The brilliant filly who is owned by Khalid Abdullah secured the Older Horse of 2018. This triumph comes despite having a quiet start to the year only to make a stunning comeback in the September Stakes at Kempton before becoming the eighth horse to win Europe’s premier all-age middle-distance contest, the Qatar Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe twice. The five-year-old made more history becoming the first horse to follow up success in the Longchamp feature with a victory in the breeder’s cup turf at Churchill Downs.
The other older horse nominees who missed out on the award were Cracksman, Poet’s Word, and Lightning Spear. Jessica Harrington’s filly Alpha Centauri, Stradivarius, who is also trained by Gosden, and Enable were the other nominees for the main award.
There was more success on the night for Gosden as Stradivarius won the Stayer Award. Stradivarius, who is owned and bred by Bjorn Nielsen, went through the year unbeaten with five victories, among them the Goodwood Cup and the Gold Cup. He was also successful in the Yorkshire Cup QIPCO British Championships Long Distance Cup.
Two-year-old colt Too Darn Hot and top stayer Stradivarius completed the list of five awards for Gosden’s horses.
2018 Cartier racing awards full list of winners: Cartier Two-Year-Old Colt: Too Darn Hot, Cartier Two-Year-Old Filly: Skitter Scatter, Cartier Three-Year-Old Colt: Roaring Lion, Cartier Three-Year-Old Filly: Alpha Centauri, Cartier Sprinter: Mabs Cross, Cartier Stayer: Stradivarius, Cartier Older Horse: Enable, Cartier Horse of the Year: Roaring Lion owned by Qatar Racing Limited, Cartier/Daily Telegraph Award of Merit: David Oldrey.
