It may have come three days later than expected, but Dubai Honour (Ire) claimed his third Australian Group 1, and fourth of his career, in Tuesday's rescheduled Tancred Stakes at Rosehill. The seven-year-old has been a model of consistency for his owner Mohamed Obaida and trainer William Haggas. He's not only won nine times, but he has also been placed nine times, in top-class contests from Ascot to Sha Tin, accruing prize-money in excess of £4.5m.
Dubai Honour's sire Pride Of Dubai (Aus), winner of the G1 Blue Diamond Stakes and G1 Inglis Sires in a relatively short-lived racing career before retiring to Coolmore Australia, made three reverse-shuttle trips to Ireland between 2017 and 2019. He didn't really catch the imagination in Europe, despite being from the same family as Kodiac (GB), Invincible Spirit (Ire) and, now, Mishriff (Ire). But in Australia, Pride of Dubai is within grasping distance of the general sires' championship for the 2024/25 season, and is currently breathing down the neck of another former shuttler, Zoustar (Aus). His particularly notable offspring include Australian Horse of the Year Pride of Jenni (Aus), G1 Everest winner Bella Nipotina (Ire) and G1 Might And Power Stakes winner Deny Knowledge (Ire), who was runner-up in Saturday's G1 Australian Cup.
Step back a generation further on the top line of Dubai Honour's pedigree and you find Street Cry (Ire), a stallion who died age 16 just over a decade ago, but who certainly should not be overlooked as a sneakily good influence.
Twenty-three years ago Street Cry was being prepared by Saeed Bin Suroor for an attack on the Dubai World Cup, back in the days of Nad Al Sheba. He was only his trainer's second string, behind odds-on favourite Sakhee, who ended up finishing third, some nine lengths behind him. Back in the States, the son of Machiavellian was then a similarly easy winner of the GI Stephen Foster Handicap that June. Street Cry retired to Darley's Jonabell Farm in 2003, shuttling to Australia on and off for nine seasons, and set about compiling a portfolio of offspring as diverse and international as they come.
Dubai Honour has now won four Group 1s | Scoop Dyga
His 23 Group/Grade 1 winners include his first-crop sons and Darley stallions Street Sense (the first horse to win the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and Kentucky Derby) and Street Boss; Shocking (Aus) (Melbourne Cup); Lyric Of Light (GB) (Fillies' Mile); and Whobegotyou (Aus) (Caulfield Guineas) – and that's before we get to two of the most celebrated fillies of the modern era on either side of the world: Zenyatta and Winx (Aus). To have produced just one of those two great race mares would have ensured Street Cry's place in bloodstock history.
Returning to the Australian sires' table, Street Cry's influence can be found not just in Pride Of Dubai, but also via his sons Street Boss and the New Zealand-based Per Incanto, both of whom feature in the top 20, while in the New Zealand championship, Shocking and Per Incanto are in the top five.
Street Cry's record as a broodmare sire is none too shabby either. Last year's champion two-year-old in Australia, Broadsiding (Aus), by Darley's upwardly mobile young sire Too Darn Hot (GB), is out of the Street Cry mare Speedway (Aus), and it is a position he also occupies in the pedigree of Classic hope and last year's GI Summer Stakes winner New Century (GB) (Kameko), and also in the other Group 1 winner on Rosehill's card on Tuesday, Treasurethe Moment (Aus) (Alabama Express {Aus}), who landed the Vinery Stud Stakes for Yulong Investments.
This Saturday in Dubai, Street Cry's name will echo down the years as the broodmare sire of the highest-earning horse of all time, Romantic Warrior (Ire) (Acclamation {GB}), who lines up for the G1 Dubai Turf, and of the defending champion in the G1 Dubai Sheema Classic, Rebel's Romance (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}).
Street Cry is the broodmare sire of Romantic Warrior | HKJC
Street Cry has played a significant role in ensuring that his Ballymacoll Stud-bred dam Helen Street (GB) (Troy {GB}), winner of the Irish Oaks in 1985 for Lord Weinstock, is remembered as a 'reine de course'.
Helen Street's earlier mating with Machiavellian had resulted in a daughter, Helsinki (GB), who would earn some small black type in France for Sheikh Mohammed but would later find far greater fame as the dam of Shamardal. In Darley alone now, that stallion's sons include Blue Point (Ire), Pinatubo (Ire), Earthlight (Ire), and Victor Ludorum (Ire). Elsewhere his most successful son Lope De Vega (Ire) is at Ballylinch Stud, while plenty of Shamardal's grandsons are waiting in the wings to make their mark, including Lucky Vega (Ire), Lope Y Fernandez (Ire), Look De Vega (Ire), and Big Evs (Ire).
Indeed, in Tuesday's Tancred Stakes, behind Dubai Honour in second and fourth were Lope De Vega's sons Duke De Sessa (Ire) and Arapaho (Ire). (Horses bred in Europe were the first nine home from 11 runners.)
Street Cry's sire Machiavellian, by Mr Prospector, is now being heavily outgunned in Europe by the male-line descendants of his paternal half-brother Seeking The Gold. What could have been a tenuous strand through Dubai Millennium (GB), who died leaving just one small crop, has flourished thanks to the latter's remarkable son Dubawi (Ire).
Machiavellian's male line has rested largely on Street Cry, whose runners seemed to work everywhere, and to a lesser extent Medicean (GB). The latter's grandson Starman (GB), by Dutch Art (GB), got off to a good start with his first runner at Dundalk last Friday, but it will be a while before we know if he can truly pick up the baton.
It is as a broodmare sire that Machiavellian has thrived, notably filling that role for current champion Dark Angel (Ire) and the fast-rising Mehmas (Ire), both of whom are by Acclamation (GB). Considering those two stallions alone, and the fact that Lope De Vega is inbred 3×3 to him, then there is an increasing probability of the blood of Machiavellian being found in today's runners.
Street Cry, who was posthumously named champion sire in Australia in 2015/16, remains his strongest conduit on the top line and yet still seems somewhat unheralded. This is not however the case within the Godolphin and Darley ranks.
Dan Pride, Godolphin's chief operating officer in the USA, says, “Street Cry was in the first group of Godolphin racehorses who retired to Jonabell as Darley stallions.”
Street Cry is commemorated in bronze at Jonabell | Racingfotos
Despite his good race record, with performances solely on dirt, Street Cry, with his European pedigree and imperfect conformation, was not however the easiest sell. An enticement was issued in that owners of Grade I-winning or Grade I-producing mares would not have to pay his stud fee of $30,000. Thirty-one breeders took up that offer in his first book of mares which ran to 131.
“Fast-forward to his first crop, which broke the record for the highest number of stakes winners and graded stakes winners in America at that time and included Zenyatta, Street Sense and Street Boss,” Pride adds.
“How many of those stakes winners do you think were out of those 31 mares? Zero.
“That taught me a valuable lesson: nobody knows nothing and ultimately it is going to be up to the horse.”
He continues, “When Street Sense won the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and the Kentucky Derby, that whole deal was Street Cry. He gave us legitimacy in the stallion market and proved that hopefully we were going to be an important player. He launched us. And then he shuttled to Australia and got Winx. He ended up with legendary horses in both hemispheres.
“You look at our global stallion roster now: Street Cry started it and then you've got Street Sense and Street Boss, both from that first crop, and now grandsons Maxfield and Speaker's Corner, and Anamoe is a grandson in Australia. His influence hasn't waned. It's as prevalent and relevant today as it has ever been.”
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