Deep Field has set Hong Kong records for both progeny earnings and individual winners as the curtain came down on the 2023/24 racing season.
The son of Northern Meteor, officially pensioned by Newgate in 2023 due to fertility issues, finished the year with 26 individual winners, double that of his nearest rivals Zoustar and Per Incanto, and six more than his previous record of 20 set last year.
Now a three-time winner of leading sire by winners, the Hong Kong obsession with Deep Field continues. With 67 runners in total, 39 more than the next highest Per Incanto, he has a massive advantage over other sires and his progeny won 44 of the 831 races contested through the season.
His seasonal progeny earnings of HK$93.4 million (AU$17.7 million) is far and beyond anything achieved by a sire in Hong Kong before. The previous best was the HK$78.8 million (AU$14.9 million) his progeny earned in the 2022/23 season.
In a measure of how lucrative prizemoney is in Hong Kong, he achieved this with only two stakes winners for the campaign, the Group 1 Stewards’ Cup winner Voyage Bubble and the Group 3 winner Mugen.
Deep Field’s progeny in Hong Kong have now surpassed HK$260 million, or over AU$50 million in earnings across 91 runners. That is higher than any other sire and more than what his 575 runners in Australia have earned.
Coolmore’s Starspangledbanner was the second highest earning sire on $70.6 million, with 11 winners from 25 runners. Swettenham Stud’s Toronado was third on $56.3 million, with 12 winners from 23 runners.
For the first time, four sires had over HK$50 million in progeny earnings for the season with the fourth being Acclamation, whose achievements in Hong Kong have been carried by newly crowned Hong Kong Horse Of The Year winner Romantic Warrior.
To give that stat some context, it was only in 2020/21 that $50 million seasonal prizemoney mark was broken for the first time, in that case by Medaglia D’Oro.
Widden’s Zoustar had his best Hong Kong season when it came to individual winners with 13, while Little Avondale Stud’s Per Incanto, who was leading Hong Kong sire by winners in 2022/21 and 2021/22, also had 13.
Deep Field’s final crop of just nine foals are about to turn one, while his soon-to-be two-year-old penultimate crop number is just 64.
He has three sons active at stud in Australia, Widden’s Portland Sky, Newgate’s Cosmic Force and Geisel Park’s Aysar.
Hong Kong 2023/24 sires rankings by progeny earnings
Source: Arion.co.nz
