Eye Keep Smiling retired

9 September 2026

ADAM HAMILTON 

SUPERSTAR mare Eye Keep Smiling has run her last race.

Owner-breeder Jackie Gibson confirmed her retirement after finishing fourth at Menangle last Saturday night.

She heads to the breeding barn at Success Stud with an amazing race record of 51 starts for 30 wins, nine seconds, two thirds and $961,526.

Trainer-driver Luke McCarthy was lavish in his praise of Eye Keep Smiling.

“She was one of the best mares I’ve ever trained, if not the best,” he said.

“She was an absolute pleasure to train, so big and strong and she could do almost anything in her races.

“She never let me down and to win three Golden Girls in a row shows how special she was.”

Eye Keep Smiling’s third Golden Girl win came just three starts back when she was typically brave at Albion Park on July 18.

Gibson said the Golden Girl wins ranked up with her greatest moments, too.

“That second one, when I had my mum trackside with me, that was such a special night,” she said.

“Then to come back and for Luke to peak her at the right time and with it a third time, we’ll always treasure that.

“The other race I always think back to is when she ran third in the (Group 1) Len Smith Mile (September 6, 2025) when she was checked about four or five times and still flew home to almost win.

“I can even go right back to when she first went onto the track for Mark Hewitt (who trained her at two before she joined McCarthy). That was a proud moment, too.”

The first of Eye Keep Smiling’s five Group 1 wins came at three in the 2023 NSW Breeders Challenge.

Along with her three Golden Girls, the daughter of Sweet Lou’s other Group 1 win came in last year’s Queen Elizabeth II Mile (formerly Ladyship).

She paced her career best 1min49.3sec mile that night, but many say the 1min49.9sec sitting parked over 1660m in her second Golden Girl at Albion Park was her defining performance.

Eye Keep Smiling is already a mum with her only foal, a Bettors Delight colt, turning heads at Cran and Chrissie Dalgety’s Kentuckiana Farm in NZ’s South Island.

She will return to Bettors Delight this breeding season.

“I’m hoping for a filly so I can continue the family,” Gibson said.

“She’ll be back home in the next day or so and I’ll be able to go out every day and smile when I see her.

“The thrill she’s given us all on the racetrack has been incredible and now she gets the chance to do it as a mum.”