Stay Inside
With a month of the Australian racing season remaining, Stay Inside has added more sizzle to the first season sire contest with another stakes winner.
The Newgate Farm based Golden Slipper winner added another important marker to his fast-building stud record when The Machine Gun became his fourth stakes winner, drawing him level with Home Affairs by that measure and adding further weight to his impressive freshman campaign.
The Machine Gun’s victory in the Listed Tattersall’s Stakes at Eagle Farm was significant on multiple fronts. It came at only his second start, it saw him stretch successfully to 1400 metres, and it showed the toughness and race sense that has become a recurring theme among Stay Inside’s first crop.
Having won on debut at Canterbury, the Peter Snowden-trained colt took the next step quickly, producing a determined performance to remain unbeaten and give his sire another black type success.
Stay Inside’s four stakes winners, Incognito, Blue Door, Lassified and The Machine Gun, have come from a smaller runner base than several of his main rivals, making the quality of his strike rate impossible to ignore. Incognito announced the stallion’s arrival early with victory in the Group 3 Breeders’ Plate, Blue Door added another Group 3 success in the Kindergarten Stakes, Lassified struck in the Listed Wellesley Stakes in New Zealand, and The Machine Gun has now completed the quartet with a late-season Listed win in Queensland.
Giving further merit to his start, Stay Inside’s stakes winners have not been confined to one jurisdiction, one stable, or one narrow racing pattern. They have been seen early, they have trained on through the season, and they have shown the versatility to perform across different states, conditions and distances. For a young sire, that breadth of performance adds a qualitative factor that cannot be underplayed.
While Home Affairs holds an insurmountable lead as the freshman sire with the highest earnings, underpinned by the Golden Slipper triumph of Guest House, Stay Inside pulling level on stakes winners gives the final month of the season a heightened sense of intrigue.
“We really couldn’t have asked Stay Inside to do much more than he has with his first crop of runners,” said CHC’s Michael Smith. “From a relatively small sample size of starters, we have seen some high-quality performances and some very talented horses emerge.
“There is no doubt that the Extreme Choice ability is coming through to this next generation via Stay Inside, and I think we can be very hopeful that there is more to come from some of his early stars, as well as the large number of his stock still yet to run.”