THERE was no shortage of talent on show over the Breeders’ Cup weekend, and all with something to look forward to next year. A pair of two-year-old winners, together with three-year-olds who stay in training, provided plenty of excitement.
HAFFNER (USA), 2c by Justify (Scat Daddy) out of Earth Strike (Zoffany). Bred by D J Stable and Justify Syndicate
With two of his four intended runners not making it to the start, Aidan O’Brien’s hand in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf might have been slightly weakened, but Ryan Moore on Haffner put the colt’s disappointing run in the Group 1 National Stakes behind him and had the winner of that Curragh feature almost two lengths back in second this time. The win came on the back of his success in the Group 2 Royal Lodge Stakes at Newmarket.
Haffner was bred by Len Green’s D J Stable in partnership, and cost M.V. Magnier and Peter Brant (whose colours he carries) $375,000 at Keeneland. He is the second foal and winner out of the Irish-bred Earth Strike. She won a Leopardstown maiden when trained by Joseph O’Brien before heading stateside to join Mark Casse and get small blacktype. The third offspring of Earth Strike is a yearling filly by Not This Time (Giant’s Causeway).
Earth Stike is one of 11 winners out of Another Storm (Gone West). Three were group or graded winners, and the best was Order Of St George (Galileo). He was the European champion stayer in three consecutive years.
The US Triple Crown winner Justify joins Sioux Nation and No Nay Never as the third son of Scat Daddy (Johannesburg) to sire a Grade 1 juvenile winner at the 2026 Breeders’ Cup. How special is that? Haffner is the stallion’s third Breeders’ Cup juvenile winner.
EMPHATIC (USA), 2f by Nyquist (Uncle Mo) out of Convinced (Tiznow). Bred by Jon A Marshall
Trained by Irishman Brendan Walsh, Emphatic retained her unbeaten record when she added the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies to a win just four weeks earlier in the Grade 1 Alcibiades Stakes, also at Keeneland. She is the fourth Breeders’ Cup winner for her Darley sire, and three of these won the Juvenile Fillies.
Harrell Ventures paid $325,000 for her half-brother by Gunite (Gun Runner) at Keeneland in September when Emphatic had won twice but had no blacktype. Now she has two Grade 1 wins and is the best of four winners for her dam. Emphatic’s grandam bred two winners, neither of any account, but she was well related.
Her full-brother Tapit (Pulpit) win the Grade 1 Wood Memorial and is an influential sire, and his dam is a stakes-winning half-sister to the champion sprinter and triple Grade 1 winner Rubiano (Fappiano). Another familiar name in the family is that of the Grade 1 Belmont and Travers Stakes winner Summer Bird (Birdstone).
A year after he was crowned champion two-year-old in the USA, which culminated with success in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, Nyquist beat Exaggerator and Gun Runner when capturing the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby a decade ago. Bred in Pennsylvania, Emphatic is one of three Grade 1 winners this year for Nyquist (and one of 13 overall), joining Knightsbridge (third in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Classic and off to stud in 2027) and Nysos, and is one of 13 stakes winners for the stallion in 2026.
Nyquist will stand the 2027 breeding season at Jonabell Farm in Kentucky for a fee of $225,000, up from $175,000 for the past two seasons.
BACIO (USA), 3c by Maclean’s Music (Distorted Humor) out of Katie’s Kiss (Kantharos). Bred by Torie Gladwell, Cincinnati Equine, Borrowdale LLC and Knollwood Farm
“We have the fastest horse in the world” claimed Wesley Ward after Bacio ran out a clear-cut winner of the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint. This was his sixth win in seven starts, which also includes this year’s Group 1 Nunthorpe Stakes at York. He has only run once on dirt, winning on his debut, and now he heads to Australia to prove himself to a wider world.
Bacio ran at Royal Ascot in the Palace of Holyroodhouse Handicap, made all the running to win unchallenged, and repeated the feat in the Nunthorpe Stakes. He is a monster over five furlongs. His sire Maclean’s Music has four Grade 1-winning sons at stud, and Bacio will join that group in due course, just not in 2027. Maclean’s Music himself can be used by breeders in 2027 for $30,000.
Bacio is the best winner out of Katie’s Kiss, and she was sold carrying the Breeders’ Cup winner for $75,000. She numbered a single stakes win at Gulfstream Park among her four career successes. Bacio is the sole Grade 1 winner in four generations of this female family.
Maclean’s Music went to stand at Hill ‘n’ Dale Farms, where he still is, after a single run over six furlongs at Santa Anita at three, when he posted a sensational time to win by more than seven lengths. At the time, John G. Sikura, the president of Hill ‘n’ Dale, prophesised that Maclean’s Music could be the next Danzig. He isn’t, but he is best known as the sire of the Eclipse champion sprinter and five-time Grade 1 winner Jackie’s Warrior.
FURTHER ADO (USA), 3c by Gun Runner (Candy Ride) out of Sky Dreamer, by Sky Mesa. Bred by John C Oxley
Spendthrift Farm confirmed that the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner Further Ado will race again in 2027, with the intention to retire him to stand in Kentucky the following spring. They paid $550,000 for the colt as an Ocala breezer, exactly twice his yearling purchase price at Keeneland.
Before his win last weekend, Further Ado’s biggest success had come at Keeneland in April when he won the Grade 1 Blue Grass Stakes, before an unplaced run in the Kentucky Derby. He was second in the Grade 1 Pennsylvania Derby behind The Puma, and that colt got closest of any to Sovereignty in the Breeders’ Cup Classic.
Nine years ago, Gun Runner, the sire of Further Ado, won the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Classic as a four-year-old, his fourth win at that level that season. He was crowned champion older horse, but had one more big win in his arsenal, the following spring’s Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes. He made a sensational start at stud, and his first crop contained the Grade 1 Preakness Stakes winner Early Voting, Santa Anita Derby winner Taiba, dual Grade 1 winner Cyberknife, dual Grade 1 winner Gunite, four-time Grade 1 winner Echo Zulu, and dual Grade 1 winner Society.
Further Ado’s dam Sky Dreamer won twice in Canada and was graded stakes-placed in the USA. In addition to her recent Breeders’ Cup winner, she is dam of the UAE Group 2 winner Kimbear (Temple City). Sky Dreamer’s half-sister Dream Dancing (Tapit) won the Grade 1 Del Mar Oaks and is a stakes producer.
There is an earlier Breeders’ Cup association on the dam sire of this family. Further Ado’s third dam was Beautiful Pleasure (Maudlin) and she won the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Distaff. This was one of her six Grade 1 wins, and she was the champion older mare in the USA just before the millennium.