Charlie Appleby has been crowned Champion Flat Trainer for the second year in a row at the HWPA Derby Awards at the Royal Lancaster hotel in London.
Appleby, 47, a retained trainer for Godolphin at Moulton Paddocks in Newmarket, fought off sustained challenges from John & Thady Gosden and William Haggas to keep hold of the Trainers' title.
It completes a clean sweep of the Jockeys', Trainers' and Owners' Championships for Godolphin in 2022, with the organization winning the Owners' title and retained jockey William Buick lifting his first Champion Jockey trophy on QIPCO British Champions Day at Ascot.
The Trainers' Championship runs from 1st January – 31st December 2021 and is based on prize money won in that period. However, with Appleby on £6,225,397 (*as of before racing Monday, Dec. 5th) worth of prize money, he is more than £400,000 ahead of his nearest challenger Haggas, who has conceded the title with less than a month of the Championship remaining.
On winning the Championship, Appleby said: “I'm hugely proud of what myself and the team have achieved in backing the Trainers' Championship up for a second consecutive year. I'm very lucky to have the team at Moulton Paddocks and Godolphin and I'm extremely appreciative of their dedication.
“It was our aim at the start of the year to have the Champion Jockey, Trainer and Owner, for William (Buick) to get his first title was very exciting for us all. Everyone is out there to win, so what we've achieved this year in winning the three Guineas (English, Irish and French) has never been done before and cleaning up all these Championships, I'm not sure if that has been done before either. It's another feather in the cap for Godolphin and I'm very proud to be part of it.”
Overall, in Great Britain, this year Appleby has had 150 wins and 225 places from 478 runners (31% strike rate). Among those victories were 18 Group winners, with three Group 1s, including a one-two in the QIPCO 2000 Guineas with Coroebus and Native Trail, which was Appleby's first win in the Newmarket Classic.
“Winning the QIPCO 2000 Guineas was the highlight. It's something that personally I hadn't done before and had finished close on a few occasions. It's one of those races that I was very keen to get on the board. That was a very proud day,” Appleby said.
“Once Native Trail went and won the Irish Guineas, that bolstered the feeling even more, because we knew that achievement (holding the English, Irish and French 2000 Guineas at the same time) hadn't been done before. I imagine it will take a few years before it happens again!”
Appleby went on to have three victories at Royal Ascot in the shape of Coroebus (St James's Palace Stakes), Noble Truth (Jersey Stakes) and Naval Crown (Platinum Jubilee Stakes). He also took the leading trainer title at the Qatar Goodwood Festival, with five wins across the week, among them New London's win in the John Pearce Racing Gordon Stakes.
However, it was QIPCO British Champions Day which proved pivotal in the title race, with Haggas breathing down Appleby's neck ahead of Britain's richest raceday. Neither trainer had a winner on the day but runner-up placings for Modern Games (Queen Elizabeth II Stakes) and Adayar (QIPCO Champion Stakes) kept Appleby in front of Haggas, who had My Prospero and Baaeed in behind Adayar in the QIPCO Champion Stakes.
Appleby said of the title race: “In sport, when you're dealing with competitions like Premier League football or Formula One, in an ideal world you don't want to see runaway winners. For the fans and the public watching, they'd rather see competition right until the very end.
“With William (Haggas) and John & Thady (Gosden) competing with you, you're always going to be pushed right until the very end. This year William was chasing his first title, but it was really good and heathy competition. We enjoyed it, we had a bit of banter between ourselves, but most importantly from racing's point of view hopefully people were interested to see it go on right until the end.”
Hugh Anderson, managing director of Godolphin (UK & Dubai), said of Appleby's second title win: “On behalf of all of us at Godolphin, I want to offer huge congratulations to Charlie Appleby on winning the Trainers' Championship for the second year in a row. It's a great achievement and testament to his own skill as a trainer – the high points of this season are almost too many to mention but I would point to the three 2000 Guineas with 3 different colts and the Breeders' Cup hat-trick as being particular standouts.
“These are supreme training feats and he is setting a very high standard internationally as well as here in the UK. Of course, behind every great trainer is a fabulous team, which in Charlie's case extends well beyond Moulton Paddocks into our stud farms right across the Europe. Most importantly, he enjoys the full support of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed, who I know will be delighted to learn that Charlie has again won this prestigious award.”
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