This Sunday's Champion Awards have a different look, with the main Horse Of the Year award surely going to Sacred Kingdom but some of the under-categories have a contentious look. Usually, each of the individual categories has an obvious, dominant player and judging Horse Of The Year comes down to the relative merits of the category winners.
With three Group One wins, including an international event in the Hong Kong Sprint, Sacred Kingdom's achievements stand clear of his rivals for champion sprinter - Green Birdie, Ultra Fantasy, Joy And Fun and Happy Zero.
Awards are often decided by short memories, with the most recent, freshest achievements taking on a greater standing on that basis alone, but even having his season curtailed by the bout of colic on the tarmac at Chek Lap Kok has not dimmed Sacred Kingdom's stature.
He was the champion sprinter and, since no other horse managed to dominate any other category with more than one Group One for the season, he is also the logical Horse Of The Year.
The champion stayer award relies solely on the results of the Queen Mother Memorial, a Group Three handicap, and the Champions & Chater, a Group One, so the winner of the latter logically is the champion stayer and that was Mr Medici.
Brave Kid's six wins and 60-point rise in the ratings would have made him the winner of the most improved award virtually any other year. However, stablemate Entrapment's historic seven wins, 63-point rating rise and victory in the Juvenile Sprint Trophy ensure he will be named the most improved as well as the champion griffin, in a strong year for that category.
But that's where it becomes more interesting in the major categories of champion miler and champion middle distance.