Majestic Harbor Retired to Stud in Indiana

Hard-knocking campaigner Majestic Harbor  , an 8-year-old multiple graded stakes winning son of Rockport Harbor, has been retired from racing and will enter stud at Swifty Farms in Indiana for 2017.

 

Owned by the Gallant Stables parternship, Majestic Harbor was an iron horse that raced from age 2 to 8. He compiled a 10-8-7 record from 42 starts at 10 different racetracks on his way to earning $1,295,814. Majestic Harbor won at distances from a mile to 1 1/2 miles and competed in 27 stakes races, 23 of them graded.

"We elected to send Majestic Harbor to Indiana in part due to the strength of its State Breeders' Incentive Program," said Ron Beegle, managing partner of Gallant Stables. "Swifty Farms is the leading stallion farm in the state and we are delighted to have him join the stallion roster at such a prominent farm in Indiana."

Swifty Farm, near Seymour, Ind., will be holding a stallion open house Oct. 22 to let people see Majestic Harbor and the nine other stallions on its roster. The new sires 2017 stud fee will be announced at a later date.

Trained alternately by Paul McGee in the Midwest and Sean McCarthy in Southern California, Majestic Harbor won four graded stakes—the Gold Cup at Santa Anita (gr. I) and the grade III Tokyo City Cup Stakes, both in 2014, along with the Alysheba Stakes (gr. II) and grade III Mineshaft Handicap in 2016. He also placed in the grade I Stephen Foster Handicap (gr. I), finishing third by a neck behind Eagle, who was half a length behind the winner Bradster. Majestic Harbor earned a career-high Equibase Speed Figure of 116 in the Mineshaft.

McGee and McCarthy both credited Majestic Harbor's racing success to class, intelligence, tactical speed, and soundness.  

 

Bred in Kentucky by Liberation Farm and Brandywine Farm, Majestic Harbor, out of the French Deputy mare Champagne Royale, is the most successful son of Rockport Harbor (Unbridled's Song) and is a half brother to grade I winner Danza   (Street Boss), who entered stud this year at Spendthrift Farm. Champagne Royale is a stakes-placed winner who sold to Louise Courtelis and Kiki Courtelis's Town & Country Farm for $825,000 at the 2014 Fasig-Tipton November sale out of the Brandywide consignment. Besides Majestic Harbor and Danza, she has produced four other winners. Champagne Royale has a yearling filly by Eskendereya and foaled a filly by Tapit   this year.

Rockport Harbor, who died in 2013, was a graded stakes winner raced by Rick Porter's Fox Hill Farm and stood at Darley in Kentucky for seven seasons. Out of seven crops of racing age, he sired 2013 Canadian 2-year-old filly champion Ria Antonia and Mexican champion 2-year-old filly My Great Fantasy. He's had 24 black-type stakes winners to date, of which seven have graded or group stakes victories. His runners have earned nearly $30.7 million.