Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Fire At Will

Fire At Will

Declaration of War – Flirt, by Kitten’s Joy

Bred in Kentucky by Troy Rankin ($97,000 purchase by Three Diamonds Farm at 2019 Keeneland September yearling sale

Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf winner Fire At Will is expected to make his 3-year-old debut on the main track in Saturday’s Grade 2 Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park in a bid to step onto the Kentucky Derby trail.

Fire At Will won an off-the-turf edition of the With Anticipation Stakes last summer at Saratoga, going seven furlongs on a sloppy, sealed track. He ended his campaign with a pair of route victories on the turf, winning the Grade 2 Pilgrim before prevailing at the Breeders’ Cup. His pedigree strongly suggests that his future lies on the turf.

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His sire, Declaration of War, is by the versatile War Front, sire of a number of Grade 1/Group 1 winners on turf, but also the sire of dual-surface Grade 1 winner War of Will, who took the 2019 Preakness Stakes, and Omaha Beach, a multiple Grade 1 winner on dirt.

Declaration of War’s dam is a half-sister to 2012 Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags. Declaration of War won the Group 1 Queen Anne Stakes at Royal Ascot and later won the Group 1 Juddmonte International at York. In his only start on dirt, he showed the potential on that surface that was bred into him, finishing a good third in the 2013 Breeders’ Cup Classic, beaten less than a neck.

Declaration of War’s best runners have come at route distances on the turf, including 2019 Melbourne Cup winner Vow And Declare, last year’s Grade 1 Belmont Derby winner Gufo, Canadian champion Mr. Hustle, Victoria Derby winner Warning, Queensland Oaks winner Winning Ways, Grade 1 winner Decorated Invader, and French Group 1 winner Olmedo.

His best runner on dirt in the U.S. has been Silver Prospector, winner of the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club in 2019 and the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes last year.

Fire At Will is the first foal out of Flirt, a daughter of turf champion and perennial leading turf sire Kitten’s Joy. Flirt is a half-sister to Grade 1 turf winner Decorated Invader, who is by Declaration of War. Flirt and Decorated Invader are half-siblings to Jubliant Girl, a stakes winner sprinting on turf in California.

One has to go under Flirt’s third dam to find a high-quality dirt horse. This is the extended family of Bandini, winner of the 2005 Blue Grass Stakes, and Out for a Spin, winner of the 2019 Ashland Stakes.

– Nicole Russo