Bhupat Seemar
Trainer
Dubai-based trainer Bhupat Seemar has enjoyed a meteoric rise to stardom since taking out his licence in 2021.
Originally from India, Bhupat gained wide-ranging experience in the US as a young man, including a five-year spell working for the legendary Bob Baffert. Moving to Dubai whilst still in his twenties, he spent many years as assistant to his uncle Satish - a multiple champion trainer in the UAE – before taking up the main role at Zabeel Stables. He has wasted no time in establishing himself as one of the outstanding trainers in the region.
During his debut season in 2021/22 he sent out 47 winners and was crowned champion trainer, a feat he repeated with 37 winners during the 2023/24 campaign. There has been abundant quality to go with the volume of winners, Bhupat’s big victories including the 2024 Gr.1 Dubai World Cup triumph of Laurel River, plus a trio of Gr.1 successes with Switzerland, Tuz and Walk Of Stars. His international outlook was underlined in 2022 when he took his Gr.2 UAE Derby runner-up Summer Is Tomorrow to the US to run in the Gr.1 Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs. Although ultimately unplaced, the enterprise was typical of the trainer.
Bhupat has also demonstrated his deft touch for Deva Racing courtesy of the five-year-old Dubawi gelding Imperial Emperor. Sourced for 300,000 UAE dirhams (about £60,000) at the Racing In Dubai Sale, Bhupat transformed Imperial Emperor from a 95-rated turf handicapper into a horse capable of competing on the grandest stage on dirt with earnings now approaching £500,000. He won his first two starts for the stable in handicap company at Meydan towards the end of 2024, then finished second behind stablemate Walk Of Stars in the Gr.1 Al Maktoum Challenge and won the Gr.2 Al Maktoum Classic by a staggering eight lengths.
Imperial Emperor concluded his season by running in the Dubai World Cup, an incredible rise up the ladder considering where he started a few months earlier.
Bhupat enjoyed another solid campaign in 2024/25, finishing fourth in the trainers’ championship with 33 winners, and his yard will be brimming with quality when the new Dubai season gets underway in the autumn.
