New Year’s Day and Midnight Lute got major boosts on the global sire list earlier this year as their respective champion runners Maximum Security and Midnight Bisou finished one-two in the inaugural $20 million Saudi Cup. While neither stallion cracks the top 10 list based upon North American earnings – reigning leading sire Into Mischief tops that list – neither is a one-hit wonder for the season. Both had graded stakes winners in May at Santa Anita, and Midnight Lute, in particular, is having a solid season.

Eclipse champion sprinter Runhappy sparked the public’s attention after taking the Grade 1 King’s Bishop at Saratoga in stakes-record time, earning a lofty 113 Beyer Speed Figure. He followed that up with a heroic win in the slop in the Grade 2 Phoenix Stakes at Keeneland before a track-record performance in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Keeneland. He continued to flash his natural talent in the Grade 1 Malibu at Santa Anita to cap off his 3-year-old season. Runhappy retired with seven wins in 10 lifetime starts and never raced on medication.

Ny Traffic

Cross Traffic – Mamie Reilley, by Graeme Hall

Bred in New York by Brian Culnan

Maxfield was the star of the show in the Grade 3 Matt Winn Stakes last Saturday at Churchill Downs, remaining unbeaten with a victory. However, a length behind him was a colt who has quietly been a consistent force on the Kentucky Derby trail and who has months to continue his development.

Champion and prominent sire Bernardini is steadily emerging as a broodmare sire, following in the footprints of his late, great sire, A.P Indy. Bernardini recorded a triple with three stakes winners out of his daughters on Saturday at Churchill Downs.

Last week was the time for Not This Time. A graded stakes-winning juvenile himself, Not This Time got off to a fast start with two first-crop winners in as many days, taking command of the North American freshman sire list early. Through Sunday, no other freshman stallion in this region had yet recorded a winner.

Graded stakes-winning juvenile Not This Time was represented by his first winner on Thursday at Churchill Downs, with his daughter Hopeful Princess outdueling Mad Maddy to win the first 2-year-old race of the year at Churchill Downs by three-quarters of a length.

Maxfield

Street Sense – Velvety, by Bernardini

Bred in Kentucky by Godolphin

As more racing jurisdictions begin to emerge from their pandemic-forced shutdowns, there are more of the traditional early-season opportunities for juveniles – and therefore, more runners starting out for freshman sires. That’s obvious at Churchill Downs, where the second week of the track’s belated spring meeting features Kentucky’s first 2-year-old races, and the first entrants for several freshman sires, including Eclipse Award champion sprinter Runhappy.

Two foals with close connections to champions arrived over the weekend in Kentucky.

Love the Chase, dam of 2014 and 2016 Horse of the Year California Chrome, delivered a colt from the first crop of Accelerate on Saturday at Atlas Farm in Nicholasville. One day later, 2010 Horse of the Year Zenyatta delivered a filly by leading sire Candy Ride at Lane’s End Farm in Versailles.

Triple Crown winner Justify was tied as the most active stallion in North America in his first season at stud in 2019. Justify covered 252 mares, many of them top-level winners or producers, according to The Jockey Club’s Report of Mares Bred. Justify’s first foals are arriving this season – but when his first sons enter stud some handful of years from now, the rules, competition, and market they face will be quite different.