Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Maxfield
Maxfield
Street Sense – Velvety, by Bernardini
Bred in Kentucky by Godolphin
This year’s unconventional road to the Kentucky Derby resumes Saturday right where it will end in more than three months’ time – under the twin spires of Churchill Downs. Making his return in the Grade 3 Matt Winn Stakes will be Maxfield, already a winner at Churchill Downs in his debut last September before taking the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland. The Street Sense colt may be following in his sire’s footsteps with a special affinity for this track.
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Street Sense’s five graded stakes victories were highlighted by the 2006 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Churchill Downs, which sealed an Eclipse Award divisional championship, and the 2007 Kentucky Derby. He was the first horse to achieve that double, and one of just two horses to have accomplished it – the other is Nyquist. As a stallion, Street Sense is the sire of Grade 1 winners at both sprint and route distances, with those top-level progeny in the United States including Aubby K, Callback, McKinzie, Street Fancy, Sweet Reason, and Wedding Toast. His progeny also have taken to off tracks.
There is both dirt and turf ability on the bottom side of Maxfield’s pedigree, along with additional stamina. Velvety, who scored her only win at a mile and 70 yards on turf, is out of the turf Grade 3-winning Storm Cat mare Caress. That makes Velvety a half-sister to Grade 1-winning juvenile and prominent sire Sky Mesa, as well as to Grade 3 winner and multiple graded stakes producer Golden Velvet.
Caress is a full sister to Group 3 winner and prominent sire Bernstein and to Grade 3 winner Country Cat, as well as a half-sister to Group 3 winner Della Francesca. This is the extended family of champion Outstandingly, and of multiple Grade 1-winning steeplechaser Arcadius, providing further evidence of stamina.
Bernardini is an emerging broodmare sire, with his daughters producing Kentucky Oaks winner Serengeti Empress and Grade 1 winners Catholic Boy, Dunbar Road, Hunter O’Riley, and Mo Town in recent years.