Ardad three-year-old Crispy Cat, a standing dish in the top juvenile sprints in Europe last season, impressed on his American Stakes debut with victory in the $100k Texas Glitter at Gulfstream Park.
Duelling through rapid early fractions with the short-priced favourite Dr Oseran, the pair clicked through consecutive furlongs in little over 10 seconds apiece. Crispy Cat maintained his speed right to the line as his main rival fell away, winning with plenty to spare. Video of the race is available through our Twitter feed. Transferred to the stable of Jorge Delgado but still in the ownership of AMO Racing, Crispy Cat might be seen again at Royal Ascot where the colt was a luckless third in the G2 Norfolk Stakes in 2022. Badly hampered that day when bidding to emulate Ardad’s first-crop Norfolk hero Perfect Power, he is being targeted at the G1 Commonwealth Cup – also won, of course, by Champion three-year-old sprinter Perfect Power.
Crispy Cat got his career off to a winning start when successful on debut at two, when trained by Michael O’Callaghan. Beaten a nose by future multiple G1 winner Blackbeard in the First Flier Stakes, the first Stakes race of the European juvenile calendar, he was also the first colt home in the G2 Flying Childers behind star fillies Trillium and G1 Abbaye winner The Platinum Queen. A £105,000 yearling, Crispy Cat had been pinhooked as a foal for 7,500gns by Irish policeman Leon Carrick and his girlfriend, nurse Michelle Gibbons. The big sale enabled Leon to reinvest in more pinhooks and Michelle to retrain as a midwife. The couple now also have a youngster of their own.
