NZ-made sire sensation Super Seth heads to Coolmore

At just nine years of age, Super Seth has already produced a level of achievement at stud that has reached far beyond the dreams of the Chittick family’s Waikato Stud, drawing the attention of the Magnier family’s Coolmore Stud and positioning him among the most compelling young sires in Australasia.

Those achievements have paved the way for his acquisition by the Magnier family’s Coolmore Stud, with the Group 1-winning and multiple Group 1-producing son of Dundeel, secured as a yearling by Dean Hawthorne and raced in the red and white colours of Jonathan Munz, a Champion NZ First-Season Sire and Champion NZ Second-Season Sire, now bound for Coolmore’s Hunter Valley base from this season as he embarks on the next, and arguably most significant, chapter of a stallion career already rich in distinction.

“This is a massive achievement for the New Zealand industry, our fellow breeders and Super Seth’s shareholders who went all-in to help Waikato develop this world-class stallion,” said stud principal Mark Chittick, who retains a share.

“But also, for the Waikato team and our stallion manager, Ryan Figgins. It’s very hard to make a stallion, let alone to do it during the COVID-19 pandemic, where there was so much uncertainty; it’s a very big achievement for New Zealand. It makes the early mornings and long nights a little easier knowing what we’re doing is working.”

“On behalf of the Chittick family, thank you very much to the Magnier family and Coolmore team, whose enthusiasm to support New Zealand will continue on through joining us in Return To Conquer. And to our breeders, very well done – it’s a privilege to be part of this industry with you all.”

The announcement of Return To Conquer, the A$1.3 million yearling purchased by David Ellis CNZM and an unbeaten Group 1-winning two-year-old son of Snitzel, signals the next chapter for the Waikato roster.

Super Seth retired to stud in 2020 at the outset of the global pandemic, when uncertainty was the only certainty. Yet what has followed has been a genuine triumph for the New Zealand breeding industry. The Gr.1 Caulfield Guineas winner sired four Group 1 winners in the space of just three months between March and June 2025, becoming the only New Zealand-based sire to produce four elite-level winners across his progeny’s first two racing seasons. In Australasia, only Danehill bettered that feat with six, while Super Seth also equalled his broodmare sire Redoute’s Choice. In doing so, he recorded a remarkable 4.9% Group 1 winners-to-runners strike rate.

“Super Seth has been on our radar for a while now and he strikes us as a stallion that can make a significant impact on the Australian breeding industry. For a young horse, the trajectory that he is on is something that is very rarely seen. To produce three Group 1 winners in Australia from his first crop and follow it up with a Champion Two-Year-Old in his second, is an amazing achievement. Justin Carey and I came over to see him and his young stock at Waikato this week and we are very impressed by what we saw. He is going to be ideal for so many Australian mares, both physically and on pedigree,” said Coolmore’s Tom Magnier.

“It is a serious coup for us to be given the opportunity to buy Super Seth from Mark, Pippa and the Chittick family. Waikato Stud and the New Zealand industry have done all the hard work to get him to the position that he is in now and we look forward to getting him back to Australia and sending our very best mares to him. When it comes to making elite stallions, the Chittick family have got it right time and time again by producing multiple Champion Sires and we have a firm belief that Super Seth is the next one.”

“Super Seth will not be completely lost to New Zealand however, as a number of his existing New Zealand-based shareholders are staying in with us and Waikato will also continue to support him. Coolmore send yearlings to Karaka to sell each year, and we will be sending Super Seth’s with the ‘C’ brand over to sell in 2029 and beyond,” Magnier concluded.

Rewinding back to 2019 of Super Seth’s racing days, it was an imposing career on the racetrack, headlined by a dazzling victory in the Gr.1 Caulfield Guineas, with the son of Dundeel striking a chord early when winning his first two juvenile starts, including a six-length victory on debut. He returned as a three-year-old to win the Gr.3 McNeil Stakes before defeating boom Queenslander Alligator Blood in the Caulfield Guineas. Resuming after a spell, he then added the Gr.3 Manfred Stakes to his winning record before finishing runner-up against the older horses in the Gr.1 Futurity Stakes.

At the time of retirement, it was Waikato Stud and partners: GSA Bloodstock, JML Bloodstock, Milan Park, Nearco Stud, Pencarrow Stud, Garry and Mary Chittick, Richard Pegum, and Chris and Sarah Green who all committed to the stallion, with Chittick at the time of retirement saying: “Our business manager Mike Rennie was on course at the time and I told him to go and have a really good look at him. He had everything we look for in a racehorse with a stud career in mind.”

His 2020 debut season was met with strong support, attracting a high-quality, full book of 130 mares, with more than half being black-type performers or producers of such. This trend continued for his second season, as breeders were delighted with the quality of his foals.

Super Seth was quick off the mark, registering an early first winner in October 2023 when two-year-old Poetic Champion (ex Regally Blonde) demolished the field by six lengths on debut for Tony Pike, later posting three stakes placings in his juvenile campaign.

Early black-type success followed with the exciting colt Linebacker, who captured the Gr.3 Baillieu Stakes at Rosehill before finishing second in the Gr.1 Champagne Stakes at two and posting a dominant win in the Gr.1 Randwick Guineas at three. Super Photon then became his second stakes winner, remaining unbeaten with victory in the Listed 2YO Stakes at Te Rapa, while Feroce also added merit with a narrow second in the 2024 Gr.1 Caulfield Guineas before getting his elite-level win the following autumn.

December 2024 and January 2025 proved pivotal for his Waikato Stud-bred daughters, with Sethito winning the Gr.3 Bonecrusher Stakes and La Dorada taking the Karaka Million 2YO before adding the Gr.2 Matamata Breeders’ Stakes.

Feroce then handed Super Seth his first Group 1 in the Australian Guineas at Flemington, followed a week later by Linebacker’s Randwick Guineas triumph. La Dorada later secured the Gr.1 Manawatu Sires’ Produce Stakes, and in May, Maison Louis added further top-level success with victory in the Gr.1 Queensland Derby.

His highest-priced yearling to date came at NZB’s National Yearling Sale when Pencarrow Stud’s colt out of Irion was secured for $700,000 by Patella Bloodstock, and in 2026 to date it was Mark and Denny Baker’s Hallmark Stud who sold a colt for $675,000 at Karaka to Australian connections.

Super Seth’s rise stands as a powerful endorsement of the New Zealand industry, its horsemanship, its breeders and its ability to develop world-class stallions from the ground up.