Pontchatrain, Top Kisser retired

California stakes winners Pontchatrain and Top Kisser have been retired and will be bred in 2015.

Pontchatrain finished seventh in the Grade 2 Goldikova Stakes at Santa Anita last Sunday. Following the race, Craig Bernick of owner Glen Hill Farm said on Twitter that it was time for Pontchatrain "to be a mom" and that the 4-year-old was having breathing difficulties.

By War Front, Pontchatrain won 6 of 10 starts and earned $446,392 for Glen Hill Farm and trainer Tom Proctor. Pontchatrain won four consecutive turf stakes from September 2013 until February of this year.

She won three stakes on Santa Anita's hillside turf course – the Unzip Me Stakes, the Grade 3 Sen. Ken Maddy Stakes, and the Grade 2 Monrovia Stakes – before a win in the Grade 2 Buena Vista Stakes over a mile in February. Pontchatrain was sidelined with an injury after that race.

Top Kisser, a 5-year-old by Old Topper, won three stakes this year and ended her career with a win in the Grade 3 L.A. Woman Stakes at Santa Anita on Oct. 4. Trainer Jerry Hollendorfer said on Wednesday that it was unclear whether owner Tom Stull would breed Top Kisser in Kentucky or at his Tommy Town Thoroughbreds farm in California.

Top Kisser won 7 of 14 starts and earned $407,100.