The Jockey Club of Canada hosted the 50th Sovereign Awards ceremony through a live presentation on the evening of April 24.
The top three finalists in each category are determined by the online ballots of the Jockey Club of Canada's knowledgeable voters. The media category award finalists were determined by media professionals within the industry selected from across North America.
Equine Awards
Horse of the Year, Champion Male Sprinter: Patches O'Houlihan
Trainer: Robert Tiller
Owner/Breeder: Frank Di Giulio Jr.
Pedigree: 4-year-old bay gelding, Reload — Maythefourthbwithu (Silent Name )
2024 Record: 4-1-0 from five starts for earnings of $364,262
Stakes Wins: Nearctic Stakes (G2T), Bold Venture Stakes (G3), Vigil Stakes (G3), Pink Lloyd Stakes
Stakes Placings: Kennedy Road Stakes (G2)
Horse of the Year Vote Totals: Patches O'Houlihan (97), Full Count Felicia (49), Filo Di Arianna (48)
Champion Male Sprinter Vote Totals: Patches O'Houlihan (166), Filo Di Arianna (85), My Boy Prince (21)
Champion 2-Year-Old Female: Nitrogen
Trainer: Mark Casse
Owner/Breeder: D. J. Stable
Pedigree: 2-year-old bay filly by Medaglia d'Oro — Tiffany Case(Uncle Mo)
2024 Record: 0-1-2 from three starts for earnings of $137,204
Stakes Placings: Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (G1T), Natalma Stakes (G1T)
Vote Totals: Nitrogen (114), Souper Supreme (62), Aristella (39)
Champion 2-Year-Old Male: He's Not Joking
Trainer: Josie Carroll
Owner: Di Scola Boys Stable
Breeder: James Wasserson
Pedigree: 2-year-old bay colt, Practical Joke — Collegeville Girl (Central Banker )
2024 Record: 2-1-1 from five starts for earnings of $113,891
Stakes Wins: Grey Stakes (G3)
Stakes Placings: Display Stakes
Vote Totals: He's Not Joking (86), Scorching (77), Dream On(61)
Champion 3-Year-Old Female: Caitlinhergrtness
Trainer: Kevin Attard
Owner: Siena Farm and WinStar Farm
Breeder: Jesse Korona
Pedigree: 3-year-old chestnut filly, Omaha Beach — Belatrix (Giant's Causeway)
2024 Record: 2-1-1 from six starts for earnings of $622,712
Stakes Wins: King's Plate Stakes
Stakes Placings: Woodbine Oaks, Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup Stakes (G1T)
Vote Totals: Caitlinhergrtness (166), Stormcast (76), Avana (28), Kin's Concerto (28)
Champion 3-Year-Old Male: Dresden Row
Trainer: Lorne Richards
Owner: True North Stable and Bloom Racing Stable
Breeder: TCR Ranch
Pedigree: 3-year-old chestnut colt, Lord Nelson — Elle Special (Giant's Causeway)
2024 Record: 3-2-1 from six starts for earnings of $233,799
Stakes Wins: Durham Cup Stakes (G3), Ontario Derby (G3)
Stakes Placings: Autumn Stakes (G2), Prairie Bayou Stakes, Toronto Cup Stakes
Vote Totals: Dresden Row (151), My Boy Prince (100), August Rain (39)
Champion Female Sprinter: Play the Music
Trainer: Mark Casse
Owner: Glassman Racing
Breeder: Laura McKinney
Pedigree: 4-year-old bay filly, Mo Town —Hey Little Sister (Jump Start)
2024 Record: 4-0-2 from seven starts for earnings of $227,637
Stakes Wins: Royal North Stakes (G3T), Whimsical Stakes (G3), Lightning City Stakes
Stakes Placings: Hendrie Stakes (G3)
Vote Totals: Play the Music (160), Gal in a Rush (47), Stormcast (44)
Champion Female Turf Horse: Full Count Felicia
Trainer: Kevin Attard
Owner: Gold Square
Breeder: Joseph Allen
Pedigree: 5-year-old bay mare, War Front —Claire de Lune (Galileo)
2024 Record: 2-0-0 from five starts for earnings of $447,453
Stakes Wins: E. P. Taylor Stakes (G1T), Canadian Stakes (G2T)
Vote Totals: Full Count Felicia (182), Fev Rover (58), Stormcast (30)
Champion Male Turf Horse: Filo Di Arianna
Trainer: Mark Casse
Owner: Gary Barber, Wachtel Stable, and Peter Deutsch
Breeder: Stud Principessa di Capri
Pedigree: 8-year-old chestnut gelding, Drosselmeyer—Principessa Capri (Northern Afleet)
2024 Record: 2-2-1 from six starts for earnings of $423,597
Stakes Wins: Highlander Stakes (G2T), King Edward Stakes (G2T)
Stakes Placings: Woodbine Mile Stakes (G1T), Twin Spires Turf Sprint Stakes (G2T)
Vote Totals: Filo Di Arianna (180), Patches O'Houlihan (65), My Boy Prince (21)
Champion Older Main Track Female: Fashionably Fab
Trainer: Kevin Attard
Owner: Terra Racing Stable
Breeder: Terra Farms
Pedigree: 4-year-old dark bay or brown filly, Silent Name—Flashy's Legacy (Curlin )
2024 Record: 3-0-1 from six starts for earnings of $216,879
Stakes Wins: Belle Mahone Stakes (G3), Ontario Matron Stakes (G3), La Prevoyante S.
Stakes Placings: Trillium Stakes (G3)
Vote Totals: Fashionably Fab (161), Elysian Field (83), Big Hug (24)
Champion Older Main Track Male: Paramount Prince
Trainer: Mark Casse
Owner: Michael Langlois and Gary Barber
Breeder: Ericka Nadine Rusnak
Pedigree: 4-year-old chestnut gelding, Society's Chairman—Platinum Steel (Eddington)
2024 Record: 3-0-1 from six starts for earnings of $236,572
Stakes Wins: Seagram Cup Stakes (G2), Dominion Day Stakes (G3)
Stakes Placings: Eclipse Stakes (G2)
Vote Totals: Paramount Prince (160), Wicked Django (52), Apprehend (35)
Outstanding Broodmare: Platinum Steel
Chestnut mare, 2010
Eddington—Crafty Toast (Crafty Prospector)
Six starters, five winners, one champion, one graded black-type winner, one black-type winner, one black-type placer
Progeny earnings: $1,187,224
Ericka Rusnak took a chance on Platinum Steel in 2017, purchasing the stakes-placed mare for $25,000 from the 2017 Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale in foal to young stallion Kantharos . A longtime farm manager at Hill 'n' Dale Farm, Canada, and a small-scale breeder, Rusnak was attracted to Platinum Steel's physical look. She kept the first two foals the mare produced for her and then privately sold her 2020 offspring, a colt by Society's Chairman, following the 2021 Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society Yearling Sale. Later named Paramount Prince, he would go on to change his breeder's life. Raced by Mike Langlois and Gary Barber, Paramount Prince won the 2023 King's Plate and was named Canada's champion 3-year-old male at the 2023 Sovereign Awards. In 2024, Paramount Prince added two graded stakes races to his resume and was named champion older main track male.
Vote Totals: Platinum Steel (109), Executive Affair (80), Dancing Allstar (35)
Special Sovereign Award: Moira
Canada's queen of racing saved her best for last.
Moira, the 2022 Canadian Horse of the Year and champion 3-year-old female, charged down the Del Mar turf course last November and held on to win the Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf (G1T). With jockey Flavien Prat up, she boosted her career earnings to $2,996,017, making her the eighth-richest Canadian-bred of all time. Recently named 2024 Eclipse Award champion female turf horse, she is only the third Queen's Plate winner to also record a victory at the Breeders' Cup World Championships, following fellow Canadian greats Dance Smartly and Awesome Again.
Human Awards
Outstanding Breeder: Adena Springs
In Canada:
Starters 43; Winners 20
2024 Record: 30-22-28 from 204 starts for earnings of $1,648,676
For decades, Frank and Frieda Stronach's Adena Springs has been home to champion racehorses and some of the strongest bloodlines in Canadian racing history. Since their first outstanding breeder award in 1984, they have been similarly honored another 13 times, including for 2022 and 2023. Sadly, Frieda passed away last March before the farm was recognized as the outstanding breeder of 2023. In 2024, their horses made headlines in Canada and beyond.
Vote Totals: Adena Springs (123), Chiefswood Stables (81), Anderson Farms Ont. (59)
Outstanding Owner: Gary Barber
In Canada:
2024 Record: 26-16-16 from 119 starts for earnings of $2,152,717
Stakes Wins: 6
Barber won his first Sovereign Award as outstanding owner for the 2023 racing season, and his stable followed up that success with another solid Woodbine campaign in 2024. In fact, Barber, who led all Woodbine owners by earnings in 2020 and 2021, saw his horses record new personal best marks for him, including purse earnings.
Barber's horses are trained by perennial Sovereign Award-winning trainer Mark Casse, and his best runner of 2024 was 2023 champion 2-year-old male My Boy Prince. The Ontario-bred gray/roan colt was one of the year's top runners, with three straight wins in the King Corrie Stakes, Queenston Stakes, and Plate Trial Stakes. Favored in the King's Plate Stakes, the gutsy colt had the lead into the stretch, but couldn't hold off the victorious Caitlinhergrtness.
Vote Totals: Gary Barber (147), Chiefswood Stables (61), Bruno Schickedanz (49)
Outstanding Trainer: Kevin Attard
In Canada:
2024 Record: 80-64-68 from 412 starts for earnings of $4,821,223
Stakes wins: 11
Attard joined an elite group of trainers when his prized pupil, Moira, won last year's Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf at Del Mar. The victory was the seventh by a Canadian-bred in more than 40 years of the World Championship races, and with it, Attard became just the fourth Woodbine-based trainer to win a Breeders' Cup race. Moira, the Canadian Horse of the Year of 2022 and Attard's first Queen's Plate winner, also captured the Beverly D. Stakes (G2T) at Colonial Downs.
An eight-time finalist for outstanding trainer, Attard had another stellar season on his home turf. One of the highlights was the thrilling victory by filly Caitlinhergrtness in the 165th King's Plate.
Vote Totals: Kevin Attard (135), Mark Casse (134), Josie Carroll (18)
Outstanding Jockey: Sahin Civaci
In Canada:
2024 Record: 170-113-98 from 645 starts for earnings of $6,717,826
Stakes Wins: 17
In just six years, Civaci has gone from a new face in the Woodbine jockey colony to his first leading rider title and second Sovereign Award nomination for outstanding jockey. It has been a remarkable rise in success for Civaci, who was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, but learned horsemanship in his parents' homeland of Turkey.
Civaci began his career in 2014 at Hastings Racecourse before moving his tack to Woodbine in 2019. Every year he has ridden in Canada, he has surpassed his efforts from the year before, and 2024 saw Civaci set many personal marks in addition to capturing his first riding title. Civaci, represented by agent Leroy Trotman, was hot from the beginning to the end of the Woodbine season, even winning six races on one card in November.
Vote Totals: Sahin Civaci (181), Rafael Manuel Hernandez (81), Patrick Husbands (30)
Outstanding Apprentice Jockey: Sofia Vives
In Canada (includes statistics as journeyman):
2024 Record: 82-64-61 from 518 starts for earnings of $3,136,798
Canada's outstanding apprentice jockey of 2023, Vives bolstered her profile in 2024 with some monumental victories before she transitioned to a journeyman rider in late August. In fact, Vives won her first stakes race April 27, 2024: the Star Shoot Stakes aboard Sabatini for honored Hall of Fame trainer Josie Carroll.
The victories came steadily throughout the summer for Vives, and, July 20, the South Carolina-born rider had the biggest day of her career, winning the Connaught Cup Stakes (G2T) on Cruden Bay and guiding Kin's Concerto to victory in the Woodbine Oaks one race later.
Vote Totals: Sofia Vives (167), Fraser Aebly (87), Petro Moran (68)
E. P. Taylor Award of Merit: Roger Attfield
Canada's most famous Thoroughbred trainer has enough achievements to fill a book. One more will be added to Attfield's long list of prizes when The Jockey Club of Canada presents him with the prestigious E. P. Taylor Award of Merit at the 50th Annual Sovereign Awards.
Selected unanimously by The Jockey Club of Canada's Stewards, the E. P. Taylor Award of Merit is a lifetime achievement award honoring those who have made significant contributions to the Thoroughbred industry in Canada and accomplished outstanding individual achievements in Canadian Thoroughbred racing and breeding.
Special Sovereign Award: Emma-Jayne Wilson
Wilson has firmly established herself as one of Canada's all-time top jockeys in her 21 years in the saddle. In 2024, she reached new heights when she passed National Museum of Horse Racing and Hall of Fame jockey Julie Krone for all-time purse earnings for a female jockey.
For this feat, and her contributions to the sport, The Jockey Club of Canada recognizes Emma-Jayne Wilson with a Special Sovereign Award at the 50th annual Sovereign Awards ceremony.
Outstanding Groom: Victor James
James was 19 years old when he left his homeland of Grenada to come to Canada in search of a career. His father was already working in Ontario and he believed his son would have a better chance of finding employment if he, too, came north.
James worked in a factory in Etobicoke, not far from Woodbine, which is where his sister, Althea, and her husband, Aaron, eventually began working. The pair encouraged James to try his hand on the backstretch, but he turned them down. At one point, Woodbine trainer Josie Carroll started calling James each spring to see if he wanted some barn work.
Outstanding Off-Track Worker: Ian Dick
On a typical early spring day, Dick is not only immersed in prepping racehorses at Buttigieg Training Centre, he has just helped a broodmare deliver the first foal of the year for the farm.
For almost two decades, the Scottish-born horseman has played an integral role at the Egbert, Ontario, farm owned by successful owner, trainer, and breeder, Paul Buttigieg. You won't see Dick at the racetrack very often, but his fingerprints are all over recent Sovereign Awards champions such as Paramount Prince, Patches O'Houlihan, and Pink Lloyd, along with graded stakes winners Artie's Storm and Phil's Dream.
Media Awards
Outstanding Writing: Mike McIntyre
"Resolve and Reinvention at a Gallop"
Published: Aug. 17, 2024, in the Winnipeg Free Press
Outstanding Photograph: Mary Jane Sibbitt
"Right Way/Wrong Way"
Published: Dec. 8, 2024, on JockeysCanada.com
Outstanding Audio Visual/Digital Broadcast: Horse Racing Alberta
"The Women in Thoroughbred Racing"
Released on TheHorses.com on Nov. 25, 2024
This press release has been edited for content and style by BloodHorse Staff.
