Battle of Midway, retired to stud after his victory last fall in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, has been found to be subfertile and has been put back into training after impregnating just five of the 60 mares to whom he was bred this spring, Elliott Walden, the president and chief executive officer of WinStar Farm, said Sunday.

Battle of Midway, 4, is currently training at Keeneland, where he galloped on Sunday morning. He is currently under the care of Rodolphe Brisset, who has a string of horses in Kentucky for WinStar – including Tampa Bay Derby winner Quip, who ran in the Preakness – but Battle of Midway will be returning to his original trainer, Jerry Hollendorfer, in about one month, Walden said.

According to Walden, Battle of Midway was found to be missing a gene that impacted his sperm’s acrosome reaction, part of the process in which the female’s egg is fertilized.

Walden said Great American, the insurance company through which a fertility policy on Battle of Midway had been purchased, made good on a subfertility claim and, in doing so, in essence paid for and took temporary ownership of Battle of Midway. But then WinStar Farm and Don Alberto Farm, which owned Battle of Midway prior to him being syndicated for stallion duty, bought the horse from the insurance company and put him back into training. Throughout the process, he remained at WinStar.

“This is why you buy insurance,” said Walden, who said this was the first time he’d dealt with a subfertility situation in the nearly 15 years he has worked for WinStar, which currently stands 21 stallions.

My full story on this will be posted very soon at www.drf.com