Dubai’s exciting young sire son Night of Thunder is not coming to Australia for Darley this year, but he will be available to cover a limited number of mares to Southern Hemisphere time this year.
While his Northern Hemisphere runners continue to make their presence felt, with no fewer than seven of his three-year-olds taking stakes contests this year, his first crop in Australia have also been hitting the headlines.
From just 16 runners, he has sired eight individual winners and two stakes winners and is the only first-season sire in Australia to sire more than one stakes winner this season.
All his winners are quality, each rated 80 or higher by Timeform. They are headed by G3 winner A Beautiful Night and Listed winner River Night.
He is also sire of the unbeaten Cherry Tortoni, who is favourite for the Listed VRC Taj Rossi Final at Flemington on Saturday and the highly rated Rivinera Storm, fourth in the G2 Blue Diamond Prelude earlier this year.
Night of Thunder has impressive overall statistics with his 14 stakes-winners to date coming from 101 runners at an impressive strike rate just shy of 14% stakes-winners to runners.
His European runners this year are headed by Molatham, winner of the Jersey Stakes at Royal Ascot and his total number of three-year-old Black Type winners cannot be matched by any other stallion standing in Europe.
His first-crop ratio of winners to runners is an impressive 55%, yet unbelievably his second crop are doing even better so far, with 57% of his runners enjoying success on the track. They are headed by Coventry second Qaader.
Eamon Moloney, Nominations Manager at Kildangan Stud said, “The standard that Night of Thunder’s progeny have achieved in both hemispheres to date are propelling him to an elite stallion status with global appeal.
“He has just finished covering an exceptional book of mares and is now receiving a lot of interest for a limited number of southern hemisphere nominations which will be covered from his base in Kildangan Stud.”
Night of Thunder has been standing at a fee of 25,000 euros this year.