After two years of virtual events the Horse of the Year Awards is scheduled to take place at Claudelands on Sunday, 4 September.

The Awards celebrate the best of the current season, as well as acknowledging those who have taken out the respective premierships for Jockeys, Trainers, and apprentice jockeys.

Other pre-determined Awards presented include the Newcomer to Training Award and New Zealand Bloodstock’s Filly of the Year award.

The Recommendations Panel, which debates and decides the finalists for each of the voted award categories, recently met to discuss the horses which might be in the running for the flat categories.

Whereas past years have seen most categories throw up clear finalists this year’s categories saw plenty of room for robust debate.

The Three-Year-Old of the Year was the most hotly contested and has resulted in nine finalists being named.  While there were also a host of possible contenders for the Sprinter-Miler of the Year the panel has settled on six finalists.

The Recommendations Panel will reconvene at the end of the season to assess the possible finalists for the Jumping and “human” categories.  Once all finalists are decided the voting process will begin, with a cross section of more than 60 industry participants casting their votes via a Deloitte-monitored voting process. 

The flat finalists for the 2022 Horse of the Year Awards are:

Two-year-olds: (4): Dynastic, Lickety Split, Maven Belle, Wolverine.

Three-Year-Olds: (9): Asterix, Belle En Rouge, Imperatriz, La Crique, Noverre, Pinarello, Self Obsession, Sword Of State, The Perfect Pink.

Sprinter-Milers (up to 1600m): (6): Callsign Mav, Entriviere, Levante, Mascarpone, Roch ‘N’ Horse, Two Illicit.

Middle distance (1601-2200m): (4) Coventina Bay, Probabeel, Savy Yong Blonk, Tiptronic.

Stayers (2201m & further): (3) Concert Hall, The Chosen One, Uareastar.