Coal Front first millionaire for sire Stay Thirsty

Stay Thirsty was trained by Todd Pletcher to win four graded stakes races, including a pair of Grade 1 events – and the horse wasn’t done giving to his trainer just yet. On Saturday, with Pletcher watching from his Florida office, Stay Thirsty, who now stands in California, was represented more than 8,300 miles away by Coal Front, winner of the Group 2, $1.5 million Godolphin Mile at Meydan. The victory was Pletcher’s first on a Dubai World Cup program.

“He had a fantastic run,” Pletcher said of Coal Front. “Our whole team is very proud of him.”

Coal Front has now won seven of nine lifetime and is Stay Thirsty’s first millionaire, as the rich purse pushed his earnings past $1.6 million. The horse won the Grade 2 Amsterdam Stakes at Saratoga and the Grade 3 Gallant Bob Stakes in 2017 as a 3-year-old. Since returning from a layoff of more than a year, he has won three of four outings, taking the Grade 3 Mr. Prospector Stakes in December at Gulfstream, the Grade 3 Razorback Handicap in February at Oaklawn, and now the Godolphin Mile.

“He has had some health issues, on and off, but always had a ton of talent,” said Sol Kumin, who co-owns Coal Front with Robert LaPenta. “And Todd Pletcher has done a great job with him.”

Stay Thirsty, who earned his Grade 1 victories in the 2011 Travers Stakes and the 2012 Cigar Mile, began his stallion career at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky in 2013. In the fall of 2017, California owner Terry Lovingier purchased the Bernardini stallion to stand at his Lovacres Ranch. He told Daily Racing Form at the time that he hoped Stay Thirsty would cover at least 80 mares in his first California season in 2018. The stallion well exceeded that hope, covering 125 mares last year, according to The Jockey Club’s Report of Mares Bred. That ranked second among California stallions behind another newcomer Danzing Candy, with 129 mares. Those two were the only California stallions with triple-digit books.

In addition to Coal Front, Stay Thirsty’s only other graded stakes winner in the U.S. is Mind Control, who became his sire’s first Grade 1 winner when he took the Hopeful Stakes last summer at Saratoga. Mind Control went on to win the Jerome Stakes earlier this year, and finished second in the Grade 3 Gotham Stakes. He is expected to focus on shorter-distance races rather than continuing on the Triple Crown trail. Stay Thirsty does have another stakes performer in this year’s 3-year-old crop in multiple stakes winner Alwaysmining.

Prolific cross does it again

The bloodlines that produced unbeaten Triple Crown winner Justify were far from a one-hit wonder last year, as his half brother The Lieutenant was a Grade 3 winner. The same cross that produced The Lieutenant – pairing sire Street Sense with a Ghostzapper mare – has now proven successful again, as Champagne Anyone punched her ticket to the Kentucky Oaks with a victory in last Saturday’s Grade 2 Gulfstream Park Oaks.

Ghostzapper, a homebred champion for Adena Springs, has been emerging as a standout broodmare sire in recent years. In addition to Justify and The Lieutenant, both out of his Grade 3-placed daughter Stage Magic, he has been represented in that regard by Eclipse Award champion sprinter Drefong and by multiple Grade 1 winner American Gal. Champagne Anyone was produced by the unraced Ghostzapper mare Lucevan.

Street Sense, an Eclipse champion juvenile and Kentucky Derby winner now standing for Darley, has also been in the midst of a strong run in recent years. In addition to now having a likely Kentucky Oaks starter, he is represented by one of the most well-regarded older horses in the country in multiple Grade 1 winner McKinzie. That colt was second to the late Battle of Midway in the Grade 2 San Pasqual in his 2019 debut, and is expected to start in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap this Saturday. Street Sense also is the sire of 2019 Australian Group 1 winner Dixie Blossoms and 2019 Grade 3 winner Aztec Sense.