Mauritzfontein Stud’s young sire Byword (Peintre Celebre) is one of the best performed stallions currently at stud in South Africa.
Byword, whose first crop will race this season, was France’s Highweight Older Male of 2010 and earned over £690 000 (or over R12 million) in prize money.

His seven wins included one of the world’s top 2000m races –the Gr1 Prince Of Wales’s Stakes. One of the highlights of Royal Ascot each year, the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes has been won by some of the greatest racehorses in history, with past winners including such superstars as Dubai Millennium (Seeking The Gold), Ouija Board (Cape Cross), Bosra Sham (Woodman), So You Think (High Chaparral), Brigadier Gerard (Queen’s Hussar), Royal Palace (Ballymoss) and legendary sire Hyperion (Gainsborough).

Byword accounted for no fewer than seven Gr1 winners when victorious in the 2010 Prince Of Wales’s Stakes.

Six of Byword’s seven career victories came in Group or Listed races and he was placed in a further two other major Gr1 contests.

Arguably his finest effort came in defeat-Byword was beaten just half a neck by triple Gr1 Breeders’ Cup Mile winner Goldikova (Anabaa) when second in the 2010 Gr1 Prix d’Ispahan. He was also third to multiple Gr1 winner Rip Van Winkle (Galileo) in the same year’s Gr1 Juddmonte International.

From the same male line as current sire sensation Siyouni (Pivotal), Byword is from an outstanding family.
Out of the outstanding broodmare Binche (whose sire Woodman is also damsire of the great stallion More Than Ready), Byword is a half brother to multiple Gr1 winner and millionaire Proviso, and has a unraced Frankel half sister named Finche.

This is the same family as US champion Wandesta (Nashwan) and top sprinter Continent (Lake Coniston), Gr1 Grand Prix de Paris hero Zambezi Sun (Dansili) as well as a host of other Gr1 performers, and Byword traces back directly in female line to the mare Conjure (Juggler) – also the fifth dam of 2000 Guineas winner and champion sire Court Martial (Fair Trial).

The handsome chestnut’s first yearlings sold well last year –they fetched up to R2 000 000, and Byword’s first juveniles this season will include siblings to the high class stakes performers Easy Game (Var), Wishful Eye (Var), and Sky Rise (Fort Wood).

His first runners also include the R2 000 000 colt out of Gr1 SA Fillies Classic runner up Kalami (Daylami).