Top cat
Brilliant, phenomenal, special….how can we possibly describe Discreet Cat with just a single word? Tom Durkin called him the “MonsterMiler.” At the top of his game, the gorgeous bay colt was a “World Beater.”
Naturally gifted, Discreet Cat was invincible at two and three. He won his first six starts by a total of 38 lengths. In his premiere, he stole away from a promising group at Saratoga to win at six furlongs with three and a half lengths to spare. On paper, he scored a 106 Beyer – an extraordinary feat for a two-year-old.
Shipped to Dubai for the winter, Discreet Cat landed a stinging blow to a field of three-year-olds in a preparatory mile to his next engagement, the G2 UAE Derby. Like a well seasoned professional, he comfortably cruised through the early fractions of the 1800-meter race. Jockey Frankie Dettori recounted his ride, “He surprised me by going so easily in the race and was traveling like the winner all the way around.”
When called upon, Discreet Cat’s instantaneous turn-of-foot could not have been more inspiring. He burst into contention at the 400-meter marker and drew off to win by six lengths over a field that included two up-and-coming superstars of the Dubai World Cup, Invasor and Well Armed, as well as Chilean champion Simpatico Bribon.
In a strong Aussie accent, Terry Spargo’s voice rang through the Nad Al Sheba grandstand, “The Derby is all about Discreet Cat!”
His time was the second fastest ever for the Derby - a race written for northern and southern hemisphere three-year-olds. Despite being nine full months the junior, Discreet Cat handed the future Horse of the Year Eclipse winner Invasor his only defeat.
Returning to stakes competition in the US, Discreet Cat rolled to a front-running, ten-and-a-quarter-length score in the G2 Jerome H where he strolled through a mile in 1:36.46 and earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 115.
Leading into his first G1, the Cigar Mile, which also happened to be his first crack at older horses, Discreet Cat was so well regarded that racing officials assigned him high weight of 124 pounds – four more than G1 Met Mile and G1 Breeders' Cup Sprint winner Silver Train and seven to the advantage of multiple G2 winner Badge of Silver.
Discreet Cat raced in the shadow of greatness on that late autumn afternoon. He disregarded the imposition; tripped the three-quarter mark in 1:07 3/5 (one tick off Kelly Kip’s record); and streaked to his sixth consecutive victory by three and a quarter lengths. All gazes panned back to the toteboard Teletimer after the Darley silks streaked past the wire. It was quickly realized that Discreet Cat not only eclipsed the stakes record shared by Quiet American and Dispersal, but he equaled the jaw-dropping record mile (1:32 2/5) set by Easy Goer at Aqueduct in 1989.
In all, Discreet Cat earned $1,694,180. He won six of nine, and placed in the G1 Vosburgh and G1 Breeders’ Cup Mile at four. Along with being the leading earner for the Storm Cat-sired, multiple Graded Stakes Winner Forestry, Discreet Cat shared the three-year-old world championship in 2006 with his classic-winning barn mate at Darley, Bernardini. Impossible to separate, their World Rating of 128, last year matched the rating assigned to Zenyatta for her memorable season.
Private Account sired Discreet Cat’s dam Pretty Discreet – a winner at six to ten furlongs. As the son of Damascus, one of the greatest racehorses of the twentieth century, Private Account has shown intrinsic worth on either side of American pedigrees. Ingrained with speed herself, Pretty Discreet’s performance in the G1 Alabama (2:02) is second only to Go for Wand by time in the centenary race that has been contested at ten furlongs since 1917. Pretty Discreet’s full sister is G1 Kentucky Oaks winner Buryyourbelief.
Private Account’s contributions as a broodmare sire include champion two-year-old Filly My Flag, the daughter of immortal Personal Ensign, as well as numerous other high-earning G1 winners - Pompeii, Good Journey, and Aldebaran among them.
One of Discreet Cat’s half-brothers is the very promising Todd Pletcher-trained three-year-old Discreetly Mine, who led from post to wire to take the G2 Risen Star Stakes on 20 February, having finished second in the G1 Champagne S and G2 Futurity S last summer. Another is the G1-placed Stakes Winner Pretty Wild - a consistent juvenile who had two tough losses while second to Sky Mesa in the G1 Hopeful and to Whywhywhy in the G1 Futurity. Discreet Cat’s prolific pedigree also includes two graded-placed half-brothers - Discreet Treasure and Discreetly Awesome. The latter produced Awesome Maria, a filly whose late surging style earned her a tiara in the G2 Matron, and came very close at top level in the G1 Frizette S.
Discreet Cat is bred on the same Storm Cat/Damascus cross that produced four-time G1 winner Johannesburg. As a sire of sires, Storm Cat is renowned for his precocious runners. Over the past decade, five freshman stallions from the paternal Storm Cat line have claimed Leading Freshman Sire titles for their sheer number of winners.
Since entering stud, Discreet Cat has covered no less than 140 Stakes winners or producers of Stakes winners. His first foals include fillies out of Loving Claim (Hansel) – a G1 winner in France; the superior distaffer Manistique, whose exploits included the G1 Vanity, G1 Santa Margarita and G1 Santa Maria handicaps; andthe dazzling grade-level sprinter Chip (Norquester). Unbridled Elaine (Unbridled’s Song), a third generation Breeders’ Cup winner, produced a colt that arrived as a three-quarter brother to Etched, a game colt that in 2009 gruelingly battled for a full nine furlongs to upgrade his status to G2 and came within two-fifths of a second of a track record. Silentea (Cherokee Run), the G2 Astarita sparkler, also dropped a colt last year.
We have every reason to believe that Discreet Cat will be drawing compliments on his first crop yearlings at the sales this summer. Last November at Fasig-Tipton, the first foal for Kittery Point (Include) - a colt from the family of Storm Cat’s grade one winning granddaughter Sweet Talker, was hammered down for $110,000. At Keeneland, a chestnut colt out of the Thunder Gulch half-sibling to Arlington Million and Secretariat S. turf star Kicken Kris brought home $105,000; as well $100,000 was paid for a fine bay colt from a black-typed Honour and Glory mare.
Discreet Cat established himself in an arduous market above numerous veteran stallions, with a ‘sale average-to-stud fee’ ratio that bettered not only the numbers of Rock Hard Ten, Tale of the Cat, After Market, and Kitten’s Joy, but even topped the selling ratio of Unbridled’s Song, Dynaformer, Kingmambo, Smart Strike, and Giant’s Causeway – whose fees are all in the six-figure range.
Discreet Cat is standing the 2010 season for $20,000 Stands and nurses.
03 March 2010