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Our friends at Wasabi recently acquired the young mare Giving Spirit just days after her 3YO half-brother Maycocks Bay won an allowance race at the Fair Grounds for Godolphin and trainer Mike Stidham, earning a 95 Beyer Speed Figure. Maycocks Bay is a son of Speightstown, one of the leading sires of the last decade or so, and a renowned sire-of-sires. Given how high we are on Speightstown’s young son Nashville (in fact, Wasabi just bred the very first foal ever by Nashville at the beginning of January), we believe that he’ll make a perfect mate for Giving Spirit this spring as we hope for Maycocks Bay to continue his progression and bring a black-type update to Giving Spirit’s page.
A $460k yearling purchase by the team at WinStar, Nashville has to be one of the best-looking stallions in Kentucky. We clearly aren’t the only ones enamored with him, given that he covered 204 mares during his first season at stud in ‘23 and the buzz continues to build as he approaches his second year in the breeding shed. We expect him to be very popular again, especially if his first foals look anything like he does (the filly bred by Wasabi certainly looks the part).
Whereas Speightstown’s offspring have run the gamut from 2YO through older horses, on turf and dirt, sprinting and going the classic American distance of 10 furlongs, Nashville followed in his sire’s footsteps and excelled exclusively as a dirt sprinter. He won his first 3 races by open margins, including the Perryville Stakes at Keeneland on the Breeders’ Cup undercard in which his final time of 1:07.89 was a new track record, and significantly faster than Whitmore ran in winning the G1 BC Sprint later in the day. Nashville’s wicked sprinting speed was somewhat surprising given that he’s out of a mare by Mizzen Mast (a G1W at 7 furlongs, but also as far as 10 furlongs) and whose own dam is a full-sister to Kentucky Derby winner Giacomo — but we think that bodes well for his chances of being a versatile sire, much in the mold of Speightstown.
And there’s plenty of versatility in Giving Spirit’s pedigree to bring out whatever Nashville winds up bringing to the table — this foal’s broodmare sire will be Ghostzapper, a brilliantly-fast winner of the BC Classic who has sired the likes of champion sprinter Goodnight Olive, as well as of Dubai World Cup winner Mystic Guide, and whose daughters have produced Triple Crown winner Justify champion sprinter Drefong, and likely champion turf horse Up to the Mark. Giving Spirit’s dam, Hallie Belle (by Medaglia d’Oro), was a multiple stakes-winning turf miler who was classy enough to pick up a Grade 3 placing when stretched as far as 1-3/16 miles, and so far Maycocks Bay has wins at 6-1/2 furlongs and at a mile and 70 yards, both on dirt. Hallie Belle, in turn, is out of a French G3 winner who has also produced the multiple G3-winning juvenile sprinter/miler Alms.
Thus there is plenty of multi-surface speed in this matchup, and physically both Nashville and Giving Spirit tend in that direction as medium-sized, well-balanced horses with plenty of substance to them.
The Speightstown/Ghostzapper cross has produced the good G3-winning sprinter Bobby’s Wicked One and black-type winner Panther Island from just about 30 runners, and when you look back at the Speightstown/Medaglia d’Oro cross (again, he being Giving Spirit’s broodmare sire) you’ll find no fewer than four G1Ws, including Olympiad, Prince of Monaco, Rock Fall, and Competitionofideas (speaking again of versatility).
So this is a pairing that already has plenty going for it, and will only look better if Maycocks Bay continues to develop and win a stakes race or two in 2024!