We are down to single digits for number of stakes races left to run before the 2018-19 season is done and dusted and Snitzel will be crowned the Champion stallion for the third consecutive time.
It may not have been his best season for number of stakes-winners and was comprehensibly outpointed in that category by I Am Invincible 28 to 12, however, he sure knew how to win the big ones.
His son Redzel won just two of eight races for the season, the Group III Concorde Stakes and The Everest at Randwick but he contributed $6.3 million to Snitzel’s total of over $23 million.
To put that into perspective, Redzel, in the same number of starts, Winx (Street Cry) banked $7,267,250 for her unbeaten season of seven Group 1’s and a Group II.
I Am Invincible is $300,000 ahead of Snitzel for the race as Champion sire of 2yo’s and leads him eight to three in stakes-winners but I Am Invincible’s leading 2yo earner is the Group III winner and dual Group 1 runner-up Loving Gaby who has earned almost $800,000 less than Snitzel’s Magic Millions 2yo Classic heroine Exhilarates.
Saturday’s Ladbrokes Cash Out Hcp (1400m) at Caulfield does not carry black-type but the Leon and Troy Corstens-trained Morrissy can contribute a further $74,250 to Snitzel’s tally.
The 3yo chestnut colt was $240,000 yearling purchase for Shane Morrissey and Malua Bloodstock out of the Vinery draft at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Sale.
If the Morrissy family registered a name that was easily remembered by all of the family, then they would be following in the footsteps of Cliff Reid who owned Morrissy’s ninth dam, the 1945 Melbourne Cup heroine Rainbird.
Reid named all his horses beginning with Rain and Rainbird spawned a family that has branched off to many of today’s top horses.
Morrissy’s dam Extension Of Time (Dash For Cash) won the Listed SAJC Walter Brown Stakes and was runner-up to Serious Speed in the Group 1 One Thousand Guineas at Caulfield.
She is a daughter of that wonderful racemare Nina Haraka (Fraar) who won five races including the Group III Adelaide Guineas and she placed in the Group 1 Toorak Hcp, Group 1 Vic Health Cup and Group 1 Australia Stakes.
Nina Haraka had just five foals before her death in 2008. Besides Extension Of Time, she left the talented Levi’s Choice (Galileo) who placed in the Group III BRC Sires’ Produce Stakes. However, Nina Haraka has been clearly outpointed at stud by her unraced sister Monte Rossa who has enjoyed a fruitful liaison with Snitzel.
Monte Rossa is the dam of Group 1 VRC Lightning Stakes winner Snitzerland and the striking Kitchwin Hills stallion Sooboog the winner of the Group III VRC Aurie’s Star Stakes and runner-up in the Group II SAJC Euclase Stakes and Listed ATC Breeders’ Plate.
A last start winner at Sandown, Morrissy is one of five winners from as many to race out of Extension Of Time, whose 2yo More Than Ready (USA) colt Mr Deadline broke his maiden at Ballarat in April before finishing out of a place in the Listed SAJC Sires’ Produce Stakes.
The daughter Of Dash For Cash has been leaving it late to get in foal in the past few years.
In 2016 she left it until December 14 to get in foal to All Too Hard, which produced a colt. The following year it was December 16 before falling pregnant to the same stallion, resulting in a filly.
It was on the same date last year when Extension Of Time was covered by More Than Ready (USA), which was just three days before the Vinery legend boarded his flight home to Kentucky.
