Curlin’s incredible streak of classic success is likely to come to an end this season. The stallion, who produced a classic winner or classic-placed runner from each of his first six crops, didn’t have a starter in this year’s Kentucky Derby or Preakness, and does not have any progeny currently under consideration for the Belmont Stakes. However, the Hill ‘n’ Dale Farm stallion is streaking through an outstanding spring, and is set to be represented on the star-studded Belmont Stakes undercard.

In March of 1989, the colt who would be known as A.P. Indy was born. The son of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew lived up to his regal breeding and $2.9 million yearling price tag by winning four Grade 1 events, including the 1992 Belmont Stakes and Breeders’ Cup Classic to earn Horse of the Year honors. He then retired to Lane’s End Farm to begin the real work on his legacy.

Skywire
Afleet Alex–Meandering Stream, by Gone West
Bred in Ontario by William D. Graham ($47,000 Keeneland January mixed purchase by De Meric Stables, agent; $45,000 Fasig-Tipton Midlantic juvenile purchase by Hidden Brook, agent)

Skywire could be the latest Queen’s Plate prospect from one of Canada’s most prolific female families, which has a long record of classic success.

Although the star event of the day was California Chrome’s bid for the Triple Crown in the 2014 Belmont Stakes, perhaps that card’s biggest showdown came earlier. Multiple Grade 1 winners Beholder, Close Hatches, and Princess of Sylmar – who would eventually retire with 20 Grade 1 wins, five Eclipse Awards, and more than $10.8 million in earnings among them – faced off in the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps Stakes. Five years later, they are all on to their second careers as broodmares, and one of them will have an entrant in this year’s Belmont Stakes. 

Manitoba, at the longitudinal center of Canada, is often referred to as one of the country’s three “prairie provinces.” Its widely-varied landscape is not exactly an epicenter of Thoroughbred breeding.

Yet Manitoba-bred Escape Clause has emerged from the relative handful of foals produced in the province to become a graded stakes winner. Beaten a nose by multiple Grade 1 winner Midnight Bisou in the Apple Blossom Invitational at Oaklawn Park last out, she is expected to meet that foe again in the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps Stakes on the June 8 Belmont Stakes card.

Grade 1 winner Geri was euthanized on May 25 at Park Equine Hospital in Versailles, Ky., due to complications from colic.

Geri, who was 27, had been repatriated from Italy in 2013 to reside at the Old Friends Thoroughbred retirement farm in Georgetown, Ky.

Federal Law
Scat Daddy–Gravelly Bay, by Strong Hope Bred in Ontario by Jim Dandy Stable ($220,000 Keeneland September yearling purchase by Hunter Valley Farm)

It turned out to be a significant Preakness Stakes Day for Claiborne Farm.

The farm's flagship sire War Front sired his first American classic winner in War of Will; one race prior, Catholic Boy won the Grade 2 Dixie Stakes in his 2019 debut; and now Claiborne has purchased an interest in the versatile colt and will stand him upon retirement, the farm announced Tuesday via press release.

Jump Start, a perennial leading sire in Pennsylvania, was euthanized on May 19 at the University of Pennsylvania's New Bolton Center due to complications from colitis. The son of A.P. Indy was 20.

The off-the-track Thoroughbred Witch Hunter took a star turn on Preakness Stakes Day at Pimlico, as the Adena Springs homebred and winning racehorse was the outrider pony who helped snag Bodexpress.