Cathryn Sophia Continues Street Cry's Legacy

One of the fascinations of bloodstock breeding is that the more you know, the more you realise how much you don't know. The topic is packed with puzzles which often defy logic. For example, when Street Cry (Ire)'s early crops reached the racetrack, they provided ample proof that the 2002 G1 Dubai World Cup winner was a stallion of rare potential.

Although Street Cry's first crop numbered no more than 86 named foals, as many as 10 of them became group/graded winners. One of them, Street Sense, became the first winner of the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile to go on to triumph in the GI Kentucky Derby. Another of this crop's four Grade I winners, Zenyatta, was destined to become one of the legends of racetrack, while Street Boss proved himself to be one of the fastest members of his generation.

Three more Grade I winners emerged from Street Cry's second crop of 86 named foals, with another two among the 74 in crop number three. Altogether these first three crops contained 20 graded winners–a magnificent 8% of these crops' 246 named foals–including a total of nine Grade I winners (over 3.6%).

So how do we come to terms with the fact that Street Cry's next seven northern hemisphere crops, mainly sired at much higher fees, have so far added no more than 15 graded winners and only two more Grade I winners to his tally?

My suspicion was that there had been a substantial change in the type of mare covered by Street Cry after he began to command six-figure fees. Although much of his progeny's early success had come on dirt and all-weather, increased support from the Maktoum family inevitably involved a sizeable number of mares with European turf backgrounds.

While such an explanation for Street Cry's slackening momentum makes sense, it doesn't exactly gel with his achievements on his visits to Australia, where his fee peaked at AUS$137,500 in 2010. The last weekend in February saw him represented by three group winners on turf, with Winx gaining her fourth Group 1 success–and ninth at group level–when she took the Chipping Norton S. Another of these group winners, the G2 Caulfield Autumn Classic winner Tally, is out of a Kris S. mare and is therefore bred on the same cross as Zenyatta. And the third, the 5-year-old mare Solicit, was gaining her fifth group victory.

This impressive collection is maintaining the good work done by Street Cry's earlier Australian crops. Even though his second, third and fourth seasons were spent at the modest fee of AUS$16,500, those cheap crops included such as Shocking (Melbourne Cup) and Whobegotyou (Caulfield Guineas). His higher-priced Australian crops were to produce the recently-retired Pride of Dubai (a dual Group 1-winning 2-year-old in the 2014-15 season), Long John and Stay With Me, plus last weekend's trio of group winners.

These achievements confirm that Street Cry was entitled to sire high-class turf performers–as might be expected of a stallion whose parents were both Group 1 winners on turf in Europe.

It will be interesting to see how Street Cry's 2013, 2014 and 2015 crops turn out (he died in September 2014).

Although Darley had the misfortune to lose Street Cry at the comparatively early age of 16, the Kentucky stallion station still houses two of his most accomplished sons. Street Sense has carved out a solid career, with five of his daughters becoming Grade I winners in the U.S. Street Sense also has a couple of Group 1 winners in Australia, including Hallowed Crown, who is currently standing his first season in Ireland.

This male line has supplied some exceptional fillies, such as Zenyatta and Winx, and it may well have another star distaffer in the shape of Street Boss's unbeaten daughter Cathryn Sophia.

In winning the GII Davona Dale S. by seven lengths, the Maryland-bred filly maintained her unbeaten record and has now won four races by a total of more than 41 lengths. She is clearly a worthy winner of a race named after Calumet's champion, who recorded eight straight victories as a 3-year-old in 1979, including the GI Kentucky Oaks, GI Acorn S., GI Mother Goose S. and GI CCA Oaks.

Cathryn Sophia will need to possess more stamina than Street Boss if she is to emulate some of Davona Dale's successes, but she has already done so in winning over a mile. Street Boss was a sprinter through and through, and he has passed on plenty of speed to his offspring, such as Capo Bastone and Holy Boss.

Street Boss could have been expected to stay a mile, though, and he has already sired a Kentucky Derby third in Danza and a nine-furlong El Camino Real Derby winner in Metaboss. Fortunately, there is no shortage of stamina in the bottom half of Cathryn Sophia's pedigree to balance her 4 x 4 x 5 inbreeding to Mr Prospector.

Her dam Sheave is an unraced daughter of Mineshaft, the 2003 Horse of the Year who gained two of his Grade I successes over a mile and a quarter. Of course Mineshaft's sire A.P. Indy and grandsire Seattle Slew both triumphed in the GI Belmont S.

Mineshaft has had his moments as a stallion–enough to maintain his fee in the region of $25,000 to $30,000 in recent years. Don't forget, though, that his first-rate bloodlines and his outstanding record as a 4-year-old were enough to set his initial fee at $100,000. He maintained that fee for four years and stood his fifth season (when Sheave was conceived) at $75,000. In other words, his daughters from these early crops are likely to come from excellent families. Consequently some of them are sure to prove more effective as broodmares than they were on the track.

The early results are encouraging. Mineshaft's daughters had only 193 foals of racing age to the end of last year and there are 10 black-type winners among them. Cathryn Sophia follows Leave The Light On (Horse Greeley), Azar (Scat Daddy) and Mico Margarita (Run Away and Hide) as their fourth graded winner and there are also several graded-placed performers. As his grandsires Seattle Slew and Mr Prospector were both champion sires of broodmares, we can be confident that Mineshaft will make his mark in this sphere.

The other encouraging aspect of Cathryn Sophia's pedigree is that her second dam Belterra is a Grade II-winning daughter of Unbridled. This means that Sheave is bred to a similar pattern to the likes of Tapit (Pulpit), Orb (Malibu Moon) and Mr Speaker (Pulpit), who were sired by other sons of A.P. Indy from Unbridled mares.