Beholder during her racing career compiled a record that seems worthy of first-ballot induction into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. On Wednesday, she came ever closer to that achievement when the four-time Eclipse Award winner and three-time Breeders’ Cup winner was announced by the Hall of Fame as one of the 11 finalists on this year’s contemporary ballot. Joining Beholder on the ballot in her first year of eligibility is another top-class mare, Tepin, a champion in her own right whose career highlights included wins against males in the Breeders’ Cup Mile and at Royal Ascot in the Queen Anne. Appearing on the ballot for the first time, even though he was eligible previously, is trainer Graham Motion, best known for winning the Kentucky Derby and Dubai World Cup with Animal Kingdom. Beholder, Tepin, and Motion are part of a ballot that includes the horses Blind Luck, Havre de Grace, Kona Gold, and Rags to Riches; trainers Christophe Clement and Doug O’Neill, and jockey Corey Nakatani, all of whom appeared on the ballot the past two years but came up short of induction. Trainer John Shirreffs is back on the ballot this year after last appearing in 2018. Hall of Fame voters – numbering about 150 – can select as many as they deem worthy of induction, so in theory all 11 could get in. Each candidate must receive support from more than 50 percent of those who cast ballots. Ballots are scheduled to be mailed this week, with inductees announced May 11. This year’s induction class also will include those chosen by the Hall of Fame’s historic review committee – the equivalent of the old-timers’ committee – as well as those named Pillars of the Turf by another committee. Induction ceremonies are scheduled Aug. 5 at the Fasig-Tipton sales pavilion in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., where the Hall of Fame is located. :: For the first time ever, our premium past performances are free! Get free Formulator now! The finalists were chosen by the Hall of Fame’s nominating committee (Editor’s note: the author is part of that committee), which considered scores of candidates submitted by racing journalists, others who work in the sport, and fans. To make the final ballot, candidates had to receive support from at least 10 of the 15 committee members. Beholder, trained by Hall of Famer Richard Mandella and owned by the Spendthrift Farm of the now-deceased B. Wayne Hughes, is one of the most accomplished mares in the history of the sport. She won Grade 1 races at ages 2 through 6, won Breeders’ Cup races at 2, 3, and 6, and won Eclipse Awards at ages 2, 3, 5, and 6. She won 18 of 26 starts – and more than $6.1 million – her 11 Grade 1 wins including a victory against males in the Pacific Classic and a thrilling career finale in the 2016 Breeders’ Cup Distaff. She and Hall of Famer Goldikova are the only horses with three Breeders’ Cup wins. Tepin won the 2015 Breeders’ Cup Mile and the next June won the Queen Anne, two of her six wins in Grade 1 or Group 1 company. She was the Eclipse Award-winning female turf horse of both 2015 and 2016. Tepin, trained by Mark Casse for owner Robert “Bat” Masterson, won 13 times in 23 starts and earned more than $4.4 million while racing from ages 2 through 5. Remarkably consistent, she finished first or second in her last 15 starts. :: Want to start playing with a $510 bankroll and have access to free Formulator? Learn more Motion, 57, entered Wednesday’s racing with 2,568 career victories and purse earnings of more than $136 million, good for 15th all-time. In addition to his success with Animal Kingdom, who was the 3-year-old male champ of 2011, Motion has won four Breeders’ Cup races, including the Turf with both the popular Better Talk Now and two-time Eclipse Award winner Main Sequence. He has won 181 graded stakes, including multiple runnings of such important races as the Manhattan, Matriarch, Sword Dancer, and United Nations. He has won training titles at Keeneland and Pimlico, and his Keeneland successes include victories in the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup and Spinster, and against males by Miss Temple City in the Shadwell Turf Mile and Maker’s 46 Mile. Though based in the East, Motion has shipped West and won such important races as the Del Mar Oaks and Hollywood Turf Cup. Blind Luck, the champion 3-year-old filly of 2010, when the won she Kentucky Oaks, captured Grade 1 races at ages 2, 3, and 4 after being purchased privately and transferred to Hall of Fame trainer Jerry Hollendorfer, who also co-owned her. She won 12 times in 22 starts and earned more than $3.2 million. In addition to the Oaks, her six Grade 1 wins included the Alabama, Hollywood Starlet, Las Virgenes, Oak Leaf, and Vanity. Havre de Grace was Horse of the Year and champion older female in 2011, the year she scored her three career Grade 1 wins. She won the Apple Blossom and Beldame, and beat males in the Woodward in 2011, when trained by Larry Jones. She was trained earlier in her career by Tony Dutrow. She won nine times in 16 starts and earned more than $2.5 million for Rick Porter’s Fox Hill Farms. Kona Gold, one of the most brilliant sprinters of any era, set track records at Churchill Downs (six furlongs) and Santa Anita (5 1/2 furlongs) during a career in which he won 14 times from 30 starts, including the 2000 Breeders’ Cup Sprint, one of five consecutive times Kona Gold, a gelding, appeared in that race. He was the champion sprinter of 2000. Kona Gold recorded Beyer Speed Figures of 110 or more 17 times, 10 times was credited with a figure of at least 115, and had a career best of 123. The earner of nearly $2.3 million was trained and co-owned by Bruce Headley. Rags to Riches is best known for winning the Belmont Stakes, as well as the Kentucky Oaks, in 2007, the year in which she was champion 3-year-old filly for Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher. She won two other Grade 1 races – the Las Virgenes, when trained by Pletcher’s assistant at the time, Michael McCarthy, and Santa Anita Oaks. Rags to Riches is one of only three fillies to win the Belmont. In her brief career, she won 5 of 7 starts and earned $1.3 million for owners Michael Tabor and Derrick Smith. Clement, 56, is best known for his success with the likes of Gio Ponti, a three-time Eclipse Award winner whose victories included the Arlington Million, and Tonalist, who won the 2014 Belmont as well as the Cigar Mile and consecutive runnings of the Jockey Club Gold Cup. Last fall, Clement won his first Breeders’ Cup race with Pizza Bianca in the Juvenile Fillies Turf. Clement has won 256 graded stakes, including multiple runnings of some of the most significant grass races in the nation, like the Beverly D., Del Mar Oaks, Diana, Manhattan, Man o’ War, Shadwell Turf Mile, and Sword Dancer. He has 2,212 career victories. His runners have earned more than $149 million, placing him 11th all-time. O’Neill, 53, is a two-time winner of the Derby, with champions I’ll Have Another (who also won the Preakness) and Nyquist, as well as five Breeders’ Cup races, highlights of a career that has seen him win 2,648 races, including 134 graded stakes, and claim multiple training titles at Del Mar, Hollywood Park, and Santa Anita. His runners have earned more than $146 million, 13th all-time. He trained Hall of Famer Lava Man, who won the Hollywood Gold Cup three times and twice both the Santa Anita Handicap and Pacific Classic. Five of his horses have won Eclipse Awards. In addition to his dozens of stakes victories in this country, O’Neill owns international victories in the Godolphin Mile and Japan Cup Dirt. His best current runner is the popular Hot Rod Charlie, winner of last year’s Pennsylvania Derby. Nakatani, 50, won 3,909 races and his mounts earned $234 million during a 30-year career that saw him win 10 Breeders’ Cup races, making him now one of only 11 jockeys to reach that plateau. He won 341 graded stakes, including two Kentucky Oaks. He won five Grade 1 races aboard Lava Man, and won multiple editions of the Beverly D., Del Mar Derby, Hollywood Derby, Hollywood Gold Cup, Hollywood Starlet, Santa Anita Handicap, Santa Anita Oaks, and Santa Margarita, proving skilled on dirt and turf. Internationally, he won the Golden Shaheen. Nakatani won riding titles at Del Mar, Hollywood Park, and Santa Anita. He ranks second all-time for stakes wins at Del Mar, behind only Hall of Famer Chris McCarron – those third through 10th are all in the Hall of Fame, too – and eighth all-time in stakes wins at Santa Anita, behind seven who are all in the Hall of Fame. Shirreffs, 76, is best known for his work with Zenyatta, the Hall of Fame mare who won 19 of 20 starts, four Eclipse Awards, and two Breeders’ Cup races, that work dwarfing his victory in the Derby with Giacomo in 2005. Since training full-time in the mid-1990s, Shirreffs has emphasized quality over quantity. He has won 550 races and has purse earnings of nearly $52 million. But his relatively small barn has had outsized success, with 102 graded stakes wins, including five in the Santa Margarita and Vanity (now the Beholder Mile), three in the Lady’s Secret (now the Zenyatta) and Santa Anita Derby, and multiple victories in races like the American Oaks, Apple Blossom, and Clement Hirsch.