Irvin Naylor’s French-bred gelding Dawalan (Azamour—Daltawa, Miswaki) earned the 2015 Eclipse Award for champion steeplechase horse on Jan. 16 in Hallandale Beach, Fla.
The gelding received 165 votes, claiming the honor after capping his 5-year-old season with back-to-back Grade 1 victories in the $300,000 Grand National Hurdle Stakes at Far Hills (N.J.) and the $100,000 Colonial Cup in Camden (S.C.).
Trained by Cyril Murphy and ridden by Ross Geraghty, the horse earned $255,000 in 2015 from just his three starts in North America. He also received the National Steeplechase Association’s Lonesome Glory Champions Award as the year’s leading money earner. He’s the youngest gelding to receive the steeplechase Eclipse Award since 1998.
“This Eclipse Award means so much to me,” said Naylor, whose Black Jack Blues won the same award in 2011. “It’s very hard to put a value on it. It’s had an overwhelming effect on me and on my staff, my trainer and my riders.”
Bred by Aga Khan Studs, Dawalan has a regal pedigree. But he lost all four of his flat starts in France for his first trainer, Alain de Royer-Dupré. He was then sold to England’s Simon Munir and Isaac Souede, and he found his niche over jumps, breaking his maiden in his second steeplechase in his 4-year-old season.
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The gelding crossed the line first on three other occasions in his ensuing nine starts, but after finishing well off the board in two stakes at Cheltenham and Aintree in Great Britain, he was sold again. Naylor purchased Dawalan privately, and he transferred him to Cyril in the United States. The gelding was imported last May.
“I first heard about him through bloodstock agent Sean Clancy,” Naylor said. “He was responsible for my purchase of the horse.”
After finishing behind fellow Eclipse Award finalist Bob Le Beau in the $150,000 Lonesome Glory (N.Y.), Dawalan won the Grand National. About a month later, he landed in the winner’s circle again in the Colonial Cup, avenging his previous loss to Bob Le Beau, who was second in the Eclipse voting with 47 votes.
“We’re thankful that our small steeplechase community is recognized on a night such as this, and we look forward to the fact that steeplechase will continue to thrive in the future,” Murphy said in his acceptance speech.
Dawalan is currently being targeted for a 2016 campaign, with a first start yet to be determined.