Summer Front off to flying start at Saratoga
Summer Front has made Saratoga his battlefront this summer – and is making a statement there.
In the first three weeks of the meeting, through Aug. 2, the young Airdrie Farm stallion has been represented by five individual winners. He is tied with WinStar Farm’s perennial standout sire More Than Ready for the most winners thus far. Summer Front’s accomplishments are all the more impressive considering he has done so with fewer runners. Entering stud in 2016, he has just two crops of racing age, while More Than Ready entered stud in 2001. Summer Front also already has a graded stakes winner at the meeting, as his daughter Speaktomeofsummer won the Grade 2 Lake Placid Stakes on July 19. She is the third graded stakes winner from her sire’s first crop, joining Ete Indien and Fighting Seabee.
Millionaire Summer Front was a stakes winner in each of the four seasons he raced, with his career highlighted by victories in the Grade 2 Fort Lauderdale Stakes at Gulfstream Park, Grade 3 Hill Prince Stakes at Belmont, Grade 3 Miami Mile at Calder, and Grade 3 Cliff Hanger Stakes at Monmouth. He also won the Dania Beach Stakes at Gulfstream and King Cugat Stakes at Aqueduct, and placed in eight other stakes, including five Grade 1 events.
Summer Front is by internationally successful stallion War Front, who himself has sired two winners thus far at the Saratoga meet. In addition to Summer Front, his sons Data Link, Declaration of War, and The Factor have all sired winners at the meet. Declaration of War’s pair of winners includes Decorated Invader, winner of the Grade 2 National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame Stakes on July 18.
Tracking stallions by individual winners at the Saratoga meet, eight other stallions have three individual winners through Aug. 2, tying them behind Summer Front and More Than Ready’s five winners apiece. That octet includes two other stallions on the Airdrie roster, Cairo Prince and Creative Cause. WinStar also has another veteran representative, Distorted Humor.
Also with three winners each are American Pharoah, Big Brown, City Zip, First Samurai, and Hard Spun.