High Chaparral scoops top US turf racing award

DUAL Derby winner High Chaparral was named champion male turf horse at the Eclipse Awards in Beverly Hills, California on Monday night when local hope Azeri was crowned Horse of the Year, the Thoroughbred Times website announced.

The Aidan O'Brien-trained High Chaparral landed the Breeders' Cup Turf at Arlington Park in October to clinch his title.

Azeri, winner of eight of her nine races in 2002 including the Breeders' Cup Distaff, took 84% of the votes in the Horse of the Year category after earning a unanimous decision in the champion older female category.

The other Horse of the Year finalists were O'Brien's record-breaking miler Rock Of Gibraltar, Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes winner War Emblem and Whitney Handicap victor Left Bank,.

War Emblem earned champion three-year-old male honours while Left Bank was named top older male.

Godolphin were represented by Imperial Gesture, third to Azeri in the Distaff, in the Three-Year-Old Filly group, which went to Farda Amiga, successful in the Kentucky Oaks and the Alabama Stakes, and Dubai World Cup winner Street Cry, who had been in line for top older male.