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Great Craic is a half-sister to the G1 Kentucky Oaks winner Cathryn Sophia, who is a daughter of the Darley stallion Street Boss. Great Craic’s first foal is a daughter of Street Boss who showed talent in her brief time at the race track, and the mating made so much sense on paper that her owner decided to send Great Craic back to Street Boss again in 2022. In 2023, though, she will switch it up and visit the multiple Grade 1 winner Maxfield, a grandson of Street Boss’s sire Street Cry.
In addition to Street Boss’s G1-winning daughter Cathryn Sophia, Great Craic’s dam is also a half-sister to stakes winner Taketheodds, by Street Sense (the sire of Maxfield and, like Street Boss, a son of Street Cry), and to a 2YO of 2022 by Street Sense who was a $200,000 yearling purchase by Cash Is King. Great Craic’s page also includes the stakes winner Cruise and Danze, by Street Boss’s son Danza — so this female family has had repeated success with the sire-line.
For us, those successes are far more important than the “No Rating” assigned to this match by TrueNicks — especially in light of the fact that of the 16 winners bred on the Machiavellian/Cee’s Tizzy cross, four have now earned black-type including one stakes winner and a 2YO of 2022. So we continue to believe it’s just a matter of time before this nick achieves a (solid) rating.
Maxfield himself brings plenty to the table beyond just being a son of Street Sense. A G1 winner at both 2YO (Breeders’ Futurity) and 4YO (Clark), he won 8 of 11 total starts before retiring to stud at his birthplace, Darley at Jonabell, where he covered 163 mares in 2022 at a live foal fee of $40,000. A strapping, handsome horse with all the size and substance that you’d expect from this sire-line, he also has an incredibly athletic walk that was highlighted in a conformation video Darley put out last fall (link below). Maxfield also comes from a stellar female family — his dam, Velvety, is a daughter of the incredibly successful broodmare sire Bernardini, and she’s slightly closer than a half-sister to G1 winner and sire Sky Mesa (by Pulpit, a son of AP Indy just like Bernardini). Other stallions from this family include Bernstein and Wiseman’s Ferry.
We believe that Maxfield’s athleticism and his precocity, along with his size and pedigree, will give him every right to be an important and successful stallion, and he should be an excellent match for Great Craic on a cross that’s already worked repeatedly.
Maxfield conformation and walking video
Cathryn Sophia wins the Kentucky Oaks