Rockport Harbor was euthanized Aug. 2 at New Bolton Center in Kennett Square, Pa., due to complications arising from laminitis.
A 11-year-old son of Unbridled’s Song , Rockport Harbor won five of eight career starts for Richard Porter’s Fox Hill Farm, including the Remsen Stakes (gr. II) and Nashua Stakes (gr. III) in 2004. At 3 he ran second in the Rebel Stakes (gr. II) at Oaklawn Park | BloodHorse.com Track Profile”>Oaklawn Park. He annexed Oaklawn’s Essex Handicap (gr. III) the following year.
Rockport Harbor was represented by progeny that earned in excess of $13 million, including multiple graded-stakes winner May Day Rose and Arlington-Washington Futurity (gr. III) winner Pataky Kid.
The leading sire by progeny earnings in Pennsylvania for 2013, Rockport Harbor most recently stood at Dr. Bill Solomon’s Pin Oak Lane Stud in New Freedom, Pa.
Out of the stakes-winning Copelan mare Regal Miss Copelan, Rockport Harbor was bred in Kentucky by Heiligbrodt Racing Stable and Taylor Made Farm. He was a $470,000 Keeneland September sale yearlng in 2003.
Rockport Harbor began his stud career at Darley at Jonabell Farm near Lexington in 2007. He moved to Pin Oak prior to the 2013 breeding season.
He ranked seventh among the first-crop sires of 2010 by progeny earnigns and seventh by winners (20). He was fifth on the second-crop list of 2011 by progeny earnings while topping the list with 79 winners. Last year he was sixth on the third-crop sire list nationally while second, behind Bluegrass Cat , by winners with 105.