As we count down the hours to a new year and a new season of racing, we also look back at 2025 and the memories that the old year brought us. From the scramble for Derby points in the spring to the seaside collection of champions at another Del Mar Breeders’ Cup, this past 12 months gave us plenty of moments to remember and stories to reflect on as we look toward a fresh set of days. Included in those memories are those that will live on in the sport’s history books, including a champion clad in blue, a trailblazer from across the Pacific, and a sad goodbye to one of the sport’s essential icons.
SOVEREIGNTY
The famed royal blue silks of Godolphin had a historic three days in early May 2025: in 72 hours, the Maktoum family’s racing stable captured the Kentucky Oaks with Good Cheer; the One-Thousand Guineas with Desert Flower; the Two Thousand Guineas with Ruling Court; and the 151st Kentucky Derby with Sovereignty. If that weren’t enough history, Sovereignty would power through a three-year-old season that could earn him Horse of the Year for his overpowering performances in a laundry list of sophomore stakes.
The son of Into Mischief out of the Bernardini mare Crowned, Sovereignty needed three starts to break his maiden, but that first win came by an eye-opening five lengths in the Grade 3 Street Sense at Churchill Downs, giving him both Derby points and experience over the classic racetrack, both of which would come in handy. He kicked off 2025 with a close victory in the Grade 2 Fountain of Youth, using his powerful closing kick to catch River Thames in the race’s waning yards. A spill kept regular rider Junior Alvarado out of the saddle for the Grade 1 Florida Derby and the Godolphin flag bearer ran out of road in the stretch at Gulfstream Park, finishing 1 ¼ lengths back of Tappan Street that day. That lead to his position as third choice going in the Derby, but even with the sloppy track and vociferous crowd of 147,406 on hand for his turn in the Run for the Roses, the son of Into Mischief was not to be denied. Hewent wide on the far turn, following favorite Journalism into the stretch, dueled briefly with that rival, and then pulled ahead in the final sixteenth to win by 1 ½ lengths, giving Godolphin its first win in that American classic.
Trainer Bill Mott decided to bypass the Preakness Stakes, which Journalism would go on to win, for the Belmont Stakes, again at Saratoga Race Course and again at 1 ¼ miles. Sovereignty showed once again why 10 furlongs was his ideal distance, Alvarado keeping him tucked behind the leaders and then pouring on the power in the stretch, once again leaving Journalism in his wake as he notched Godolphin’s second Belmont Stakes by three lengths. The performance was enough to leave fans wondering what might have been had the colt been sent to Pimlico for the 150th Preakness. Given his performances on the first Saturday in May and then five weeks later at Saratoga, the son of Into Mischief gave every impression that the 1 3/16-mile middle jewel would have been his for the taking, but alas, history would never know. He was the first horse since Thunder Gulch in 1995 to win the Derby and the Belmont, but that horse also contested the Preakness, finishing third behind Timber Country.
Sovereignty’s historic campaign continued with wins in the Grade 2 Jim Dandy and then another 10-furlong turn in the Travers Stakes, his 10-length margin of victory the third longest in the race’s long history, behind Damascus’s 22 lengths in 1967 and Arrogate’s 13 ½ lengths in 2016.
A fever the week of the Breeders’ Cup Classic prevented Sovereignty from facing Journalism and Baeza, both of whom finished second and third behind him in the Kentucky Derby and the Belmont Stakes, but the Classic made history for a wholly different reason, a story that also begins with a Kentucky Derby winner.
FOREVER YOUNG 🇯🇵
Sunday Silence’s victories in the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes him on the verge of a Triple Crown in 1989, but he fell short to rival Easy Goer in the Belmont Stakes, whom he also defeated in that year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic. During that campaign, Zenya Yoshida bought into the son of Halo, and then when the colt was retired the following year, bought out his ownership group, including Stone Farm’s Arthur Hancock III, and brought him to Japan’s Shadai Stallion Station. For 12 seasons, from 1995 to 2007, Sunday Silence was Japan’s leading stallion, producing other sires like Deep Impact, who in turn sired Real Steel. In 2020, Real Steel covered a Congrats mare named Forever Darling, and on February 24, 2021, Forever Young was born.
This great-grandson of Sunday Silence was destined to follow in the black colt’s footsteps. After winning his first five starts, including the Group 3 Saudi Derby and the Group 2 UAE Derby, Forever Young came to Louisville for the 150th Kentucky Derby as another Japanese hopeful trying to break through and notch the country’s first Run for the Roses. He proved to be their best representative yet, finishing third in the race’s tightest finish in decades, just a nose behind Sierra Leone, who in turn was another nose behind winner Mystik Dan. In any other year, Forever Young could have been the one. He tried to make history again that year, attempting the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Del Mar, but was third behind Sierra Leone and Fierceness. That would not be the last the Japanese star would see of the seaside racetrack or those rivals.
In 2025, Forever Young returned for another campaign, starting with a win in the Tokyo Daishoten before heading to Saudi Arabia for the Group 1 Saudi Cup. There, he passed the famed Romantic Warrior in the race’s waning strides to win by a neck. A third in the Dubai World Cup led to a return to Japan and a victory in the Nippon TV Hai. He came back to California to face a deep Breeders’ Cup Classic field, including Sierra Leone, Fierceness, Baeza, and Journalism, for a chance to build on the legacy of Japan’s other Breeders’ Cup winners, Loves Only You (Filly and Mare Turf) and Marche Lorraine (Distaff), both in 2021 and both at Del Mar.
After shadowing a front-running Contrary Thinking early, Forever Young persevered through quick early fractions and took the lead with a quarter of a mile to go. He powered to a comfortable 1 ½-length lead through the stretch and held a fast-closing Sierra Leone in check to land Japan’s first Breeders’ Cup Classic victory, foreshadowing that it just might be a matter of time before one of their hopefuls comes east to claim another American classic, like the Run for the Roses.
D WAYNE LUKAS
A former basketball coach and teacher as well as a lifelong horseman, D. Wayne Lukas built a legacy that grew far beyond the racetrack. Inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1999, a full quarter of a century before he notched his final Triple Crown classic in 2024, Lukas made a name for himself in first the Quarter Horse ranks and then switched to Thoroughbreds, building a career that lasted a full fifty years and brought into the sport a long list of younger trainers, including Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher, Kiaran McLaughlin, Mark Hennig, Dallas Stewart, and George Weaver. His passing on June 28, 2025, marked the end of an era and a cascade of remembrances across generations of racing fans and professionals.
A Wisconsin native, Lukas fell in love with horses as a child and started training horses on the side while teaching and coaching into the 1960s. He eventually struck out on his own as a trainer, focusing on Quarter Horses, including champion Dash for Cash, until the late 1970s. His switch to Thoroughbreds brought him the chance to train his first Triple Crown classic winner, Codex, who defeated Genuine Risk, the second filly to win the Kentucky Derby, in the 1980 Preakness Stakes. He then went on to train the third filly to win the Kentucky Derby, Winning Colors (1988), as well as three other winners in Thunder Gulch (1995), Grindstone (1996) , and Charismatic (1999); five more Preakness victors, including Charismatic (1999) and Seize the Gray (2024); and four Belmont Stakes winners. His 15 classic wins were rivaled only by his 20 Breeders’ Cup winners and five Hall of Famers, including Winning Colors, Serena’s Song, and Lady’s Secret.
His record is a veritable laundry list of wins in every great stakes race on the American racing calendar, but truly Lukas’s legacy is in the people that he mentored. Nicknamed “The Coach” after his time on the sidelines of a basketball coach, he was known for pulling kids out of the stands for a chance to be in a winner’s circle photo, sparking more than one generation’s love of the sport. Many a jockey, trainer, owner, breeder, and more had their own moments with Lukas, stories about his time on the track that would include life lessons for life both in the barn and at home, continuing the coaching that had started decades earlierand guaranteeing that this legend and icon will reside in the hearts and minds of the sport forever.
Article written by Jennifer Kelly.
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