Street Cry Retired; To Stand at Jonabell

Street Cry, winner this year of the Dubai World Cup (UAE-I) and Stephen Foster Handicap (gr. I), has been retired and will stand at stud in 2003 at Sheikh Mohammed's Jonabell Farm near Lexington. No stud fee was announced.

The 4-year-old son of Machiavellian has had his career curtailed due to inflammation of his right-fore ankle. Street Cry was being pointed to the Oct. 26 Breeders' Cup Classic (gr. I) at Arlington Park.

Street Cry was bred by Sheikh Mohammed from the Troy mare Helen Street and raced for his Godolphin racing stable. He was trained by Saaed bin Suroor, though he was under the care of assistant Tom Albertrani in New York since arriving from Dubai following the World Cup.

Street Cry never finished worse than third in 12 career starts. He had five wins, six seconds, and one third, earning $5,150,837.

"It is very sad that the injury means he cannot run in (the Classic)," bin Suroor said. "It always seems to happen with the good ones.

"A very honest horse, he always tried his best. This year, from January, he was a different horse, mentally and physically. I think he will be a great sire as he is from a very good family and will prove popular with American breeders."

"When you have a horse like Street Cry and something like this happens, it is pretty devastating to the whole team," Albertrani said. "Street Cry still had great potential and it is unfortunate that he has had this injury once before when we had to scratch him from the Kentucky Derby (gr. I). It is sad to lose from the racing scene a horse of his calibre.

"He has always been a great horse to be around, being one of the nicest horses to deal with in the stable.

"Street Cry only finished out of the first two once in 12 starts and that was when he was third, beaten by Macho Uno and Point Given, in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile (gr. I). He has always given his best effort in every race and he was really good."

Godolphin racing manager Simon Crisford explained that the decision to retire Street Cry had been made because of persistent inflammation of the colt's right fore ankle which interrupted and compromised his training programme.

"We were just not prepared to take any risks with the horse," Crisford said. "We had an ambitious racing programme for Street Cry, but it would not have been possible to prepare him for races like the Breeders' Cup Classic."

"Street Cry is a horse who has literally done it all," Jimmy Bell of Jonabell Farm, said. "What the breeders are most interested in is 2-year-old form which is replicated at three and four in the highest-quality races. When you look back to his 2-year-old days, he had the co-highest Beyer speed figure of 105 which shows tremendous precociousness.

"This year he won the Dubai World and then came over to America and confirmed that form with such an easy victory in the Stephen Foster. That is the full basket -- very rarely do you get a horse that is able to show that level of 2-year-old form and becomes even more impressive at the classic distance.

He is a very well-bred horse who comes from a very popular sire line. He is also a magnificent-looking individual and when you get pedigree, performance and conformation you have what breeders are looking for."

Jonabell Farm was purchased from the Bell family by Sheikh Mohammed in 2001. At present, it houses three stallions, Cherokee Run, Holy Bull, and Old Trieste. The intention is to build up the roster of stallions significantly.

More on Street Cry's racing career, from Godolphin Racing