Grade 1 winner and sire Champs Elysees dies

Regally bred champion Champs Elysees has died of an apparent cardiac event at Castlehyde Stud in County Cork, Ireland.

The Danehill horse, who was 15, raced as a homebred for Juddmonte Farms and originally stood at its Banstead Manor Stud in Newmarket, England, entering stud in 2010. He was purchased by Coolmore in a deal announced in November 2016 to stand at its Castlehyde under the Coolmore National Hunt banner.

Out of Juddmonte’s Broodmare of the Year Hasili, Champs Elysees was a full brother to Eclipse Award champions Banks Hill and Intercontinental, both of whom captured the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf. He also was a full brother to Grade 1 winner Cacique and to Group 2 winner and leading sire Dansili, and a half-brother to Grade 1 winner Heat Haze and Grade 3 winner Deluxe.

Champs Elysees lived up to his family’s reputation, securing honors as Canada’s Horse of the Year and outstanding grass horse in 2009, highlighting a racing career in which he won 6 of 28 starts and earned more than $2.8 million. A Group 3 winner in France and Group 1 placed in Italy, Champs Elysees was shipped to North America as a 4-year-old in 2007. The following year, he won the Grade 1 Northern Dancer Turf Stakes at Woodbine, Grade 1 Hollywood Turf Cup, and Grade 2 San Marcos at Santa Anita. In his championship season, he notched a title-securing victory in the Grade 1 Canadian International at Woodbine, and he finished second in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap earlier in the season. In total, he won or placed in 16 graded stakes.

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Champs Elysees is the sire of 27 stakes winners, led by the globetrotting Trip to Paris, winner of the Group 1 Gold Cup at Ascot in England, third in the Group 1 Irish St. Leger, and second in the Group 1 Caulfield Cup in Australia. He also is the sire of English 1000 Guineas winner Billesdon Brook, Australian Group 1 winner Harlem, and graded stakes winners in North America including Colonia, Elysea’s World, Renown, and Suffused.

Champs Elysees’s other stakes performers around the world include Irish Group 3 winner Jack Naylor, French Group 3 winner Xcellence, Australian Group 3 winner Plot Twist, and Czech Derby winner and champion Gontchar.