Outstanding midsummer performances at Royal Ascot and Chantilly have had a significant impact on the points for this year’s Cartier Racing Awards.
The longstanding and prestigious awards were established in 1991 to reward excellence in horseracing. There are eight equine awards, ranging from the Cartier Horse Of The Year to the Cartier Two-Year-Old Colt and Cartier Two-Year-Old Filly.
Cracksman and Laurens are currently tied at the head of the standings on Pattern race points for Cartier Horse Of The Year, but there is a long way to go and there are plenty of others within challenging distance.
Cracksman (88), Europe’s top-rated horse in training and recipient of the Cartier Three-Year-Old Colt Award last year, was sent off a warm order to gain a third Gr1 victory of 2018 in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot on June 20.
John Gosden (photo: Investec)
But the Frankel colt, trained by John Gosden for his owner/breeder Anthony Oppenheimer, could only finish second in the 10-furlong highlight behind the Saeed Suhail-owned Poet’s Word (68), who provided his trainer Sir Michael Stoute with a record-breaking 76th success at Royal Ascot.
The two horses are first and second in the Cartier Older Horse standings, with Accidental Agent (48) also entering calculations following an emotional victory in the Gr1 Queen Anne Stakes for owner/breeder Gaie Johnson-Houghton and her daughter Eve, who trains the four-year-old colt.
Laurens (88), owned by John Dance and trained by Karl Burke, consolidated her lead in the Cartier Three-Year-Old Filly category with another gutsy display in the Gr1 Prix de Diane Longines at Chantilly, France, on June 17, when she held on to beat Musis Amica by a neck.
It was a second consecutive Gr1 success in France for Laurens following the Gr1 The Gurkha Coolmore Prix Saint-Alary at Longchamp on May 27, with the daughter of Siyouni having also finished second in the G1 QIPCO 1000 Guineas at Newmarket on May 6.
