Lit de Justice

This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (August 2018) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Lit de Justice (January 12, 1990 – July 20, 2012) is an American Champion Thoroughbred racehorse. He was bred by Robert Sangster's Swettenham Stud and purchased by the French racing operation Mise de Moratalla, who named him for a famous Parlement of Paris known as the Lit de justice. The colt was sired by El Gran Senor, who was an outstanding son of Northern Dancer and earned Irish and English Champion honours at age two in 1983 and at three in 1984. He was out of the mare Kanmary, whose sire Kenmare was a French Group One winner and the Leading sire in France in 1988 and 1989.

Trained by Alain de Royer-Dupré to run on European turf courses, Lit de Justice began racing at age two. On August 1, 1992, he finished fourth in his debut at Deauville-La Touques Racecourse. Winless at ages two and three, Lit de Justice got his first victory in his thirteenth start on June 4, 1994, in the Prix Durbar at Maisons-Laffitte Racecourse. He made one more winless start in France before being sold on July 17, 1994, to Carol and Cornelius Ray's Evergreen Farm located near Paris, Kentucky. The Rays turned Lit de Justice over to California trainer Jenine Sahadi, who conditioned the horse for racing on dirt at Del Mar Racetrack.

After a second-place finish in his American debut in a minor race on July 30, 1994, at Del Mar Racetrack, on August 27, Lit de Justice got his first American win. As a five-year-old, he won the Potrero Grande Handicap and then set a new Del Mar track record for seven furlongs in winning the Pat O'Brien Breeders' Cup Handicap before finishing third in the Breeders' Cup Sprint behind winner Desert Stormer.

At age six, Lit de Justice won four of his seven starts to go with two third-place finishes. Among his wins, he set a new Santa Anita Park track record for 5+1⁄2 furlongs in the El Conejo Handicap. His fourth win of 1996, and most important of his career, came in the Breeders' Cup Sprint at Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Sent off as the betting favorite under regular jockey Corey Nakatani, Lit de Justice won by coming from last to first in the fourteen-horse-field, defeating top runners including Honour and Glory (3rd) and Langfuhr (8th). His winning time tied a Woodbine track record that had stood for twenty-three years. The win was the first in a Breeders' Cup race for jockey Nakatani. For trainer Sahadi, it was not just her first Breeders' Cup victory, but the first by a female trainer in Breeders' Cup history.

For his 1996 performances, Lit de Justice was voted the Eclipse Award for American Champion Sprint Horse.