Ted Noffey, Sovereignty Lead Initial NTRA Media Polls

Ted Noffey and Sovereignty, honored as 2025 champions at the Resolute Racing Eclipse Awards ceremony last week in Florida, remain popular choices in early-season media voting this year. Spendthrift Farm's unbeaten Ted Noffey, trained by Todd Pletcher, leads the National Thoroughbred Racing Association's Top 3-Year-Old Poll, while Godolphin's Sovereignty, trained by Bill Mott, is first in the Top Thoroughbred Poll, counting horses of all ages. Both polls began this week, with the 3-Year-Old Poll featuring horses racing up and through the Triple Crown and the Top Thoroughbred Poll representing horses competing for Horse of the Year. The Top Thoroughbred Poll concludes Nov. 3, a couple of days after the Breeders' Cup World Championships, taking place over two days this fall at Keeneland. Graded stakes winner Paladin, Brant, Golden Tempo, and Further Ado round out the leading five in the Top 3-Year-Old Poll. Ted Noffey received 21 first-place votes, and the 2025 Remsen Stakes (G2) winner, Paladin, garnered the other two. No other 3-year-old received first-place votes. Skippylongstocking, recent winner of the Jan. 24 Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes (G1) at Gulfstream Park, received five first-place votes compared to Sovereignty's 14 first-place votes in the Top Thoroughbred Poll and sits in second. Journalism, Nysos (1 first-place vote), and Forever Young (JPN) (three first-place votes) are respectively third through fifth. Standings are determined not by first-place votes but on overall point totals on a 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-1 basis for each voter's top 10. The full standings are online.