New Grade 1-winning colt for Tapit

Sunday: Tokyo

February Stakes (Grade 1), 1m, 4yo+

TESTA MATTER (6 h Tapit - Difficult by Concern)

Bred by Waterford Farm in USA

TAPIT's rise to notoriety has been achieved through siring top-class fillies such as Stardom Bound and Zazu but the Gainesway resident can now boast another top colt to his name in Testa Matta, winner of the Grade 1 February Stakes at Tokyo, Japan, on Sunday.

The four-year-old American-bred is Tapit's second Group/Grade 1-winning colt following last year's narrow Breeders' Cup Juvenile hero Hansen. Tapit, a Grade 1-winning son of Pulpit, is the sire of seven winners at the top level, all of whom were bred off a fee of $12,500 or under. Such a start has seen Tapit's popularity soar and consequently he is covering a full book this season at Gainesway Farm in Kentucky at a fee of $125,000.

 

Testa Matta provides a timely advert for the upcoming Barretts March Selected Two-year-olds in Training Sale, having been purchased at the 2008 renewal for $60,000 by Narvick International.

A half-brother to the stakes-placed sprinter She's Impossible, Testa Matta is out of Difficult, a winning three-parts sister to Grade 3-winning sprinter Broad Smile. They are out of the 1982 Grade 1 Matron Stakes heroine Wings Of Jove.

Difficult has an unnamed two-year-old by Jump Start.