Kentucky-bred Luxor Café secured Japan’s automatic berth in this year’s Kentucky Derby (G1) with a romping win in the $228,217 Fukuryu S. over nine furlongs at Nakayama on Saturday, March 29. Earning 40 Kentucky Derby qualifying points, the win gives Luxor Café a total of 70 points to top Japan’s Road to the Kentucky Derby leaderboard.
Owned by Koichi Nishikawa and trained by Noriyuki Hori, Luxor Café has now won four straight races, three of them stakes races. He annexed the Hyacinth Stakes Tokyo at one mile on Feb. 23 and he also won the Kurochiku Sho at Nakayama in January. In the Fukuryu S., jockey Joao Moreira asked Luxor Café for his best in the final three furlongs, and the son of American Pharoah responded gamely. Racing widest of all, the colt put away the field to win by about five lengths in the end.
“He was always in a good rhythm, his response and his reaction were good,” Moreira shared after the race. “He is a really good horse.”
A Full Brother to Multiple G1 Winner Cafe Pharoah
Bred by in Kentucky by Orpendale/Chelston/Wynatt & Westerberg Ireland ULC, Luxor Café is out of the graded stakes-winning Mary’s Follies, by More Than Ready, making Luxor Café a full brother to multiple Group 1 winner Café Pharoah. Mary’s Follies is also the dam of champion Regal Glory and Grade 3 winner Night Prowler.