McKinzie retired to Gainesway Farm

McKinzie, one of the top older horses of his age group his entire career, has been retired and will begin stallion duties early next year at Gainesway Farm.

As a result, McKinzie, 5, will miss this year’s Breeders’ Cup on Nov. 7 at Keeneland. He finished second last year in the Classic at Santa Anita and was a potential runner this year in the Dirt Mile.

McKinzie finished fourth in the Alysheba Stakes on Sept. 4 at Churchill Downs in what turned out to be his final career start.

McKinzie won eight times in 18 lifetime starts and was a graded stakes winner all four years he raced, including Grade 1 victories at ages 2, 3, and 4. McKinzie won the CashCall Futurity in only his second start at age 2, then at age 3 won the Pennsylvania Derby in his first start in six months following an absence that forced him to miss that year’s Triple Crown. He finished his 3-year-old campaign by shortening up to seven furlongs to win the Malibu Stakes.

Last year, at age 4, McKinzie won twice and finished second five times, with his most significant victory coming in the Whitney. In addition to the Breeders’ Cup Classic, McKinzie last year also was second in the Met Mile, the Santa Anita Handicap, and the Awesome Again.

McKinzie won once in four starts this year, in the Triple Bend, giving him seven graded stakes victories.

McKinzie, a son of Street Sense out of the Petionville mare Runway Model, was purchased as a yearling at Keeneland September for $170,000 by the partnership of Mike Pegram, Karl Watson, and Paul Weitman, for whom he earned $3,473,360.

He was trained by Bob Baffert, and was named for Baffert’s close friend Brad McKinzie, a longtime racing executive at Los Alamitos who died of cancer in August 2017 at age 62. McKinzie made his first start two months later.