Zoustar heads Tweenhills roster for 2020 with £30,000 covering fee

Reductions applied to other members of the Qatar Racing stallion band

Australian shuttler Zoustar strikes a pose at TweenhillsCredit: Bill Selwyn / Tweenhills

Zoustar, a rising force in the Australasian stallion ranks, will head the roster at Tweenhills Stud in Gloucestershire next year when he makes his second shuttle trip to the northern hemisphere.

The son of Northern Meteor – who has been assigned a fee of £30,000, up from £25,000 in 2019 – is currently in sixth place in the leading general sires list in Australia having supplied six stakes winners this term, the joint-best tally with Pierro.

In all, his first three crops of racing age in Australia have yielded ten stakes winners headed by three-time Group 1 sprint heroine Sunlight and Group 2 scorers Haut Brion Her, Lean Mean Machine, Mizzy, Zousain and Zoutori.

Zoustar received 149 mares at Tweenhills this year, including high-class racemares La Collina and Temida and the dams of Group 1-placed two-year-olds Golden Horde and Tropbeau.

He will cover a strictly limited book of 125 mares in 2020.

Havana Gold, who supplied Group 1-winning sprinter Havana Grey in his first crop, has had the price for his services next year cut from £15,000 to £10,000.

More than 160 foals by the son of Teofilo were born this year, with over half out of stakes performers or producers of stakes performers.

Charm Spirit will remain at Tweenhills in 2020 instead of returning to Haras de Bonneval in Normandy, having alternated between the two studs for the first five years of his stallion career.

The son of Invincible Spirit, whose best performers in Europe are the Group 3 winners Kick On and Yourtimeisnow, has been given a fee reduction from £17,500 to £8,500. He was also a champion first-season sire in New Zealand and has enjoyed further success there this year as sire of Group 2 winners Aretha and Fascino.

Hot Streak, who has delivered nine winners from his first crop of two-year-olds in Europe this season, headed by Listed winner Flaming Princess and Anglesey Stakes fourth Between Hills, has received a small decrease in fee from £7,000 to £5,000.

The five-strong roster of stallions owned by Qatar Racing at Tweenhills in 2020 is completed by Lightning Spear, who will serve mares in his second season at a fee revised from £8,500 to £5,000.

A limited number of nominations and breeding rights in the Sussex Stakes-winning son of Pivotal will be available next year.

All Tweenhills fees are on October 1 special live foal terms.

Stallion	2020 fee	2019 fee
Charm Spirit	£8,500	£17,500
Havana Gold	£10,000	£15,000
Hot Streak	£5,000	£7,000
Lightning Spear*	£5,000	£8,500
Zoustar	£30,000	£25,000