secretariat: fifty years ago

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bold ruler, Kentucky Derby, secretariat

If you recall opening an issue of the weekly Thoroughbred Record dated March 24, 1973 and reading that 1972 champion Secretariat had made a successful debut to his 3-year-old season with a come-from-behind victory in the Bay Shore Stakes at Aqueduct, probably the only surprise in the recollection is that it was 50 years ago.

There are cliches that express the swiftness of time, the ease of its passing, and that sort of thing. They are dull expressions, however, and much less effective than the sharp wonder and kindling joy that the chestnut son of Bold Ruler produced in millions of people. That was half a century past, and yet time has done little to dull the enlivening sensation of that time, that colt, and the things we shared as he progressed toward the Triple Crown, then won it, and, amidst the adulation that followed, somehow found greater heights of accomplishment to test and attain.

This story, so fabled and fabulous, wasn’t supposed to be, actually. The tale of Secretariat’s accomplishment is too improbable. The best-looking colt, the death of the elderly breeder, the need for cash to settle estate taxes. The looming fears that something could go wrong and let everyone down, when that’s normally what happens, in racing and in life, amid the hopes that this time, the dream would come true. It’s a tale too far. Screenwriters and producers in Hollywood would never believe it.

Secretariat’s record-price syndication for $6,080,000 was an indication of the depth of the hopes surrounding this colt in spite of the fear of the unknown. In the racing program set out before him, Secretariat was physically challenging accepted reasoning, first that a son of Bold Ruler could win at 10 furlongs and second that any colt, no matter the sire, could win the Triple Crown again, after the most enthralling accomplishment of the turf had lain dormant for 25 years.

The worries about the colt’s pedigree were real and well-justified. Nearly all the Bold Rulers were milers; he himself had been an exceptional seven- to nine-furlong racer who handled 10 on sheer speed and class. Nearly all of Bold Ruler’s many gifted offspring wanted a mile, were taxed when raced much beyond that, and few had won important 10-furlong stakes.

Even champion Bold Lad (the best Bold Ruler prior to Secretariat and the one most like him in appearance and pedigree) had failed to handle 10 furlongs, or even nine furlongs, as Bold Lad had finished third in the 1965 Wood Memorial. In 1972, Secretariat had towered over his contemporaries for talent, and as a result of his dominance among juvenile colts, he was elected Horse of the Year, not an honor normally given to first-season racers. As a result of all the known information, Secretariat’s potential for winning the Derby was genuine, but the chance that it could fall flat was every bit as evident. That Seth Hancock could syndicate the colt in a day, before Secretariat had even started at 3, talking to professionals who knew the risks, is a testament to understanding the challenge and taking it because those involved believed.

They thought there was something special about this colt by Bold Ruler out of the grand producer Somethingroyal, and they were correct. The assumption of greatness, however, did not come to Secretariat and the people who believed in him through a series of empty blows.

There were challenges at every step of the quest that led from the colt’s seasonal debut in the seven-furlong Bay Shore to the graduation to a mile in the Gotham, the test of nine furlongs (longer than Secretariat had raced at 2), the immense uncertainty of the 10 furlongs on the First Saturday in May, the ability to step back a sixteenth for the Preakness in Baltimore, and then the highest hurdle of 12 furlongs in the Belmont Stakes that would be required to complete the Triple Crown.

The memories that come down like rain belie the distance in time of these events. Their clarity and the acuteness of the sensations they produced startles even me, because I, I remember.

(I would invite readers to post their own recollections, observations, photos, ideas, and suggestions because the memories of this horse and this time deserve our attention and careful reflection.)

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candy man rocket keeps it sweet for famed sire

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bill mott, candy man rocket, candy ride, donato lanni, scott kintz

The highweighted miler in his homeland of Argentina and unbeaten in three starts, including the Grade 1 Pacific Classic, in the U.S., Candy Ride (by Ride the Rails) has proven himself a source of speed that carries at least a mile, as well as a fountain of quality and racing enthusiasm.

With more than 100 stakes winners to his credit so far, Candy Ride had another pair in the winner’s circle on Feb. 25, with the promising and progressive Confidence Man in the G2 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark., and the lightly raced 5-year-old Candy Man Rocket in the listed Gulfstream Park Sprint.

A G3 winner of the Sam F. Davis Stakes as a 3-year-old, Candy Man Rocket was a prospect for whom great things were expected and high hopes were held. As a 2-year-old in training, the good-sized bright bay worked a quarter-mile in :21, striding out as well as any horse on the grounds at the OBS April sale. He was fluent and strong in action, with a stride length of more than 26.5 feet and a massive BreezeFig of 73.

He had all the bells and whistles.

Selling out of the Seven K’s Training and Sales consignment of Scott Kintz and family, Candy Man Rocket was popular with buyers and their inspectors, and he sold for $250,000, with Donato Lanni purchasing the colt for Frank Fletcher.

Kintz said, “Donato loved this colt, had seen him early at the farm, and was there to buy him. That sale got amazingly strong as it went on, and Donato came by the last day of the auction and told me that Candy Man Rocket would have brought 500 or 600 thousand that last session.”

Bred in Kentucky by R.S. Evans, Candy Man Rocket was raised just outside Lexington on the Leestown Road property of Wayne and Cathy Sweezey’s Timber Town Stables.

Sent to the sales as a weanling and a yearling, Candy Man Rocket was bought back each time, then went into training with Kintz in Florida and sold to Frank Fletcher Racing for $250,000 at the 2020 OBS April sale of juveniles in training.

“I’d had some horses for Mr. Evans,” Kintz recalled, “and after the colt had RNA’d at the September sale, he called me up and said he was going to send the colt to me. The colt had some x-ray issues as a yearling, and I asked Mr. Evans what he wanted me to do with him. He said, ‘Train him,’ and that colt never missed a day, never had an issue with anything. By the time he came to the sales as a 2-year-old, he’d outgrown the radiographic changes that had shown up earlier, and he was a top-notch horse.

“When Candy Man Rocket was training, he did everything right all the time; he went too fast the first time we let him run, and I wasn’t too happy about it. But the jock said he didn’t push him, that the colt just took off. He was that fast.”

The elegant colt made his debut at Churchill Downs in November and must have learned something, despite finishing well up the track. Returned to racing in January at Gulfstream, Candy Man Rocket won by 9 ¼ lengths, then picked up the Sam Davis in his next start. Immediately considered a classic prospect, the colt went off the rails in his next pair of starts, missed nearly his entire 4-year-old season.

Clearly, the talented horse has posed some challenges for trainer Bill Mott, but the conditioner has proven equal to them, and Candy Man Rocket has too. The horse has won his two starts since his long layoff, most recently the Gulfstream Park Sprint, and Mott indicated that he would give the horse a break of several weeks before his next race.

pair of graded stakes winners make a real nice week for nursery place

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happy broadbent, hopkins, jim wilhite, john donaldson, john mayer, litigate, nursery place

Breeding two horses that win graded stakes in less than a week is a notable success, made more notable by the fact that John Mayer’s Nursery Place is a relatively small operation. Nursery Place, in partnership with Happy Broadbent and Jim Wilhite, bred the 5-year-old Hopkins (by Quality Road), who won the Grade 3 Palos Verdes Stakes at Santa Anita on Feb. 5, and the farm is one of three partners that bred the 3-year-old Litigate (Blame), who won the G3 Sam F. Davis Stakes at Tampa Bay six days later. (Editor’s note: The Jockey Club lists Nursery Place as sole breeder of Hopkins.)

Both horses were raised and sold by Nursery Place, as well, and through several decades of work in breeding and raising horses, as well as selling them, Mayer and his associates have developed a reputation for producing good horses.

As a result, the right buyers will have a look at them, and both the graded winners sold out of the Nursery Place consignments. Mayer said, “We were well-paid for them, and now we just hope that they keep on doing well for their owners.”

Bred in Kentucky, Hopkins is the second stakes winner and fourth stakes horse out of the Salt Lake mare Hot Spell, who was second in a stakes at Golden Gate. Her other stakes winner is Saratoga Heater (Temple City), and she has a pair of stakes-placed racers in Of a Revolution (Maclean’s Music), who was second in the G2 Gallant Bob and third in the G3 Swale, and Malocchio (Orb), who ran second in the Sorority at Monmouth.

With those kinds of relations, people came to see Hopkins when he was presented as a yearling, and they clearly liked what they saw because the powerful bay brought $900,000 at the 2019 Keeneland September yearling sale. Expected to travel to Dubai for the upcoming Golden Shaheen Stakes, Hopkins races for SF Racing LLC, Starlight Racing, Madaket Stables LLC, Stonestreet Stables LLC, Golconda Stable, Siena Farm LLC, and Robert E. Masterson.

The Palos Verdes was the third victory in seven starts for Hopkins, who has a trio of seconds. His only unplaced effort was a sixth in the G2 San Antonio on Dec. 26.

His dam will be bred to first-year sire Olympiad (Speightstown) this year. On selecting the mating, Mayer noted that “a good many years ago, a wise man told me to breed quality older mares to promising young sires and my nice young mares to proven, older sires.”

With that philosophy, Mayer planned matings for his nice young Mineshaft mare Salsa Diavola. “We started her off like she was a good mare, with the mating to Ghostzapper,” Mayer said, “but it was the third foal (Litigate) who got her off the mark” with a stakes winner.

Bred in Kentucky by Nursery Place, John Donaldson, and Happy Broadbent, Litigate has now won two of his three starts, earning $182,590 for owner Centennial Farms. The bay was well-received at the 2021 Keeneland September yearling sale and sold for $370,000 to Centennial for one of its partnerships. Litigate was the top-priced yearling colt for his sire in 2021.

Now, Litigate is the second stakes winner of 2023 for his sire, who ranks as a top value sire in the Kentucky stallion market at $25,000 live foal. The stallion has Litigate on the Kentucky Derby trail, and his other stakes winner of 2023 is Godolphin’s Wet Paint, who will be pointing for the Kentucky Oaks in similar fashion to last year’s winner Secret Oath (Arrogate), who took the path from Oaklawn Park to Churchill.

The partners’ faith in Blame has paid off further. Litigate’s dam Salsa Diavola is in foal to Blame and “is due in a couple of weeks,” Mayer noted. The partners haven’t decided who to send her to in 2023 … yet.

“I’ve been partners with these fellows for 25 years,” Mayer said. “In doing this sort of thing, you develop relationships, and ours has worked very well. We normally buy young mares and sell them in foal. We got lucky, and it didn’t work out to get Salsa Diavola sold,” when she was bought back for $130,000 carrying her first foal to Ghostzapper.

Since then, the mare has become a graded stakes producer, like nearly everything in her family, tracing back through her dam Miss Salsa (Unbridled), the dam of G3 winner Pacific Ocean (Ghostzapper); her dam Oscillate (Seattle Slew), dam of stakes winner and sire Mutakddim (Seeking the Gold); her dam G1 winner Dance Number (Northern Dancer), the dam of champion juvenile Rhythm (Mr. Prospector); her dam champion Numbered Account (Buckpasser), dam of G1 winner and leading sire Private Account (Damascus); then back through multiple top producers to Numbered Account’s fifth dam La Troienne (Teddy), dam of champion Bimelech and several major producing lines, and herself a half-sister to Prix de Diane winner Adargatis (Asterus).

This is the family that keeps coming back, generation after generation. Litigate is the latest.

Mayer said that “this sort of success is great for my kids and for the people on the farm; it jazzes them up. But you can’t live on the expectation of having a week like that, not if you want to survive. There has to be something in it, day to day, that gets you out of bed and provides some kind of personal reward. Because, at the core, it’s just farming.

“But it has been a real nice week.”

lecomte stakes winner instant coffee runs to his heritage

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lecomte, lexington, umpire, wild man from borneo

The victory of Instant Coffee (by Bolt d’Oro) in the Grade 3 Lecomte Stakes at the Fair Grounds brings more than hopes of classic glory to the talented colt. It also reminds us of the fast and furious rivalry between Lecomte and Lexington, both sons of the great 19th-century American racehorse and sire Boston (Timoleon).

Lecomte and Lexington were foaled in 1850, the year that California entered the Union, and each was a racehorse of very high quality. Lecomte was unbeaten until his defeat by Lexington, and Lexington met his first and only defeat from Lecomte.

Lexington won the Great State Post Stakes from Lecomte, then the latter turned the tables in the 1854 Jockey Club Purse. At these races, the interstate rivalry was so intense that tens of thousands of dollars, probably hundreds of thousands, changed hands on the results. The deciding race was the 1855 Jockey Club Purse, when Lexington won the first four-mile heat and Lecomte was withdrawn from the second.

After Lexington had defeated Lecomte the second time, the bay son of Boston was retired due to failing eyesight and went to stud that year in Kentucky at W.F. Harper’s stud near Midway, Ky., for a covering fee of $100, $1 to the groom. Robert A. Alexander of Woodburn Farm had gone to England to purchase bloodstock, there met Lexington’s owner Richard Ten Broeck, and purchased the horse for $15,000, an American record price for a horse at that time.

As talented a racer as Lexington was, he proved even more important as a sire. He was the leading sire in the country 14 times in a row, with an additional two more sire titles for 16 total. The great blind stallion died at Woodburn in July 1875 at the age of 25, and his skeleton was preserved and is at the Kentucky Horse Park.

Lexington was lionized in print and illustration, as in this lithograph of the horse in racing trim on his retirement to stud in Kentucky.

An interesting facet of Instant Coffee’s pedigree is that both these great rivals figure in the pedigree of the Lecomte Stakes winner.

The role of Lexington is not a surprise. He is present in essentially all pedigrees. Among other notable connections, Lexington is the sire of 1865 Travers winner Maiden, the sixth dam of Nearco (Pharis), and Mumtaz Mahal (The Tetrarch) has Lexington twice in her sixth generation because her second dam, Americus Girl, is by Americus, who was inbred 3×3 to Lexington through Norfolk and his full sister The Nun.

So Lexington is pervasive in pedigrees the world over, but the same cannot be said for Lecomte.

After Lexington ambled off to stud, the chestnut Lecomte raced on, although he, like his sire Boston, covered mares while still remaining an active racer. Lecomte was bred in 1855 and 1856, then after defeats from a horse named Pryor (Glencoe), was sold to Lexington’s former owner Richard Ten Broeck toward the end of 1856.

From breeder-owner Thomas Jefferson Wells, Ten Broeck purchased not only Lecomte for $10,000 but also his younger half-sister Prioress (Sovereign). Together with Pryor, the two offspring of the great producer Reel shipped to England as Ten Broeck’s troika to take on the best of English racing.

For Pryor and Lecomte, the trip was a disaster. Lecomte had a sore ankle and could not stand a proper training regimen; Pryor fell ill on the trip overseas and never recovered his form. Lecomte suffered colic and died on Oct. 7, 1857, and Pryor died 15 days later, per their obituaries in the Spirit of the Times.

The sole bright spot for this tragic expedition was that Prioress raced into a triple dead heat for the 1857 Cambridgeshire Handicap and won the run-off.

On the other side of the Atlantic, the final foals by Lecomte had been born in 1857. The best racer among these was bred in Kentucky by Ten Broeck. He was a bay colt out of Alice Carneal (Sarpedon) and a half-brother to Lexington by his great rival.

Named Umpire, this colt was taken to England by Ten Broeck, and he was notably successful, at one time the actual favorite for the Derby at Epsom. On the day, Umpire started as third choice 6-1 behind The Wizard, who had won the 1860 2,000 Guineas, and Thormanby. The bettors had the first two tagged but in the wrong order, as Thormanby won by 1 ½ lengths, and Umpire was seventh in a field of 30.

Later in 1860, Umpire raced for the St. Leger at Doncaster, with Thormanby favored, but after taking the lead, Umpire could not hold on and finished seventh behind the winner, St. Albans, as the fifth choice in a field of 15. Thormanby finished 11th.

Sound and athletic, Umpire raced on, winning the Queen’s Stand Stakes at Royal Ascot in 1863, by which time he was owned by Lord Coventry.

Wild Man from Borneo was a great-grandson of Lexington’s great rival Lecomte and won the Grand National of 1895.

Sent to stud, Umpire had some foals, and his son Decider earned a place in history as the sire of one of the best-named winners of the Grand National at Aintree: Wild Man From Borneo, the victor in the great steeplechase in 1895.

In the present day, however, pride of place goes to one of Lecomte’s daughters. This is the Lecomte Mare 1857 out of Edith, otherwise unnamed. She was bred by Wells and is the 15th dam of this year’s Lecomte Stakes winner Instant Coffee.

As with Instant Coffee, nearly all of the contemporary connections to Lecomte come through the Lecomte Mare’s granddaughter Mannie Gray, the dam of Correction and her full brother Domino. Together, they exerted an extraordinary influence on American breeding, especially in the first half of the 20th century, but are still present in pedigrees today.

instant coffee perking memories as the last runner and stakes winner bred by sagamore farm

Although there is still quite a bit of purse money to race for in the coming 30-odd days of 2022, the freshman sire list has firmed up considerably. Atop the rankings is the juvenile Grade 1 winner Bolt d’Oro (by Medaglia d’Oro). If the bay colt retains his position, he will become the first son of Medaglia d’Oro to lead a sire list and the first descendant of the Sadler’s Wells branch of Northern Dancer to lead a sire list in the States since Kitten’s Joy in 2018.

On Nov. 26, Bolt d’Oro’s son Instant Coffee became the stallion’s fifth stakes victor with a 1 1/4-length success in the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes. Instant Coffee is his sire’s third graded winner, and the sire has nine racers who are stakes-placed.

Unhurried early behind slow fractions, Instant Coffee came strongly through the final three-sixteenths to win as the 1.54-to-1 favorite over Curly Jack (Good Magic), who was the second choice, had won the previous G3 Iroquois Stakes, and is one of five stakes winners by freshman sire and Eclipse champion juvenile Good Magic (Curlin), who is second to Bolt d’Oro on the freshman sire list.

If $100,000 in earnings represents a length, Bolt d’Oro is currently about three-quarters of a length ahead of Good Magic, and Justify (Scat Daddy) is about 1 ¾ lengths back in third. Then, Army Mule (Friesan Fire) is 3 ¼ lengths back in fourth, with a length on Sharp Azteca (Freud) in fifth.

Clearly, this is no 2021, when Gun Runner won the freshman sire contest by a pole, because even now there is significant room for competition among the leading cadre, and less than two lengths covers the next quartet: Mendelssohn (Scat Daddy), Girvin (Tale of Ekati), Oscar Performance (Kitten’s Joy), and Mo Town (Uncle Mo).

Other points of importance to consider among the freshmen sires is that numbers matter. Of the 73 stallions with first-year starters, only 10 had more than 100 foals. Five of those fill the top six positions, and all 10 rank among the top 18. Only Army Mule (93) broke through the barrier of the most popular stallions, and he’s not far from 100 first-crop foals.

Oscar Performance has the smallest number of foals (72) among the stallions in the top 10, and three in the top set have more than double that number: Mendelssohn (152), Bolt d’Oro (146), and Good Magic (145). In contrast, the stallion with the fewest foals among the top 20 is 12th-place Awesome Slew (Awesome Again), with 36. Yes, some of the stallions have crops exceeding his by more than 100.

Awesome Slew stands at the O’Farrell family’s Ocala Stud in Florida, and Girvin also stood there until the exploits of his first crop racers, notably four stakes winners, including G2 Saratoga Special winner Damon’s Mound, propelled a transfer to Airdrie Stud in Kentucky.

Two of the stakes winners by Girvin won restricted races in Florida, parts of the Florida Stallion Stakes Series, and the chief winner by Awesome Slew, Awesome Strong, won the In Reality and the Affirmed divisions of the stallion stakes.

Although both of those young sires benefited somewhat from standing in a regional market, that fact also circumscribed their opportunities to a degree because there are not as many mares elsewhere as in Kentucky, nor all of an equal quality.

One such good, young, well-pedigreed mare beginning her producing career is the dam of Instant Coffee.

Bred in Kentucky by Sagamore Farm LLC, Instant Coffee may be the last horse bred by Kevin Plank’s Maryland-based operation that was dispersed in 2018. Hunter Rankin, who was president of Sagamore, said that Instant Coffee’s dam, the Uncle Mo mare Follow No One, “didn’t sell at the Keeneland November sale as a broodmare prospect, and Kevin did a deal with my parents [who own Upson Downs Farm]. That’s why Sagamore is listed as the breeder. She and the foal were both at Upson Downs all along.”

Rankin also bought the mare for Sagamore as a 2-year-old in training. He said, “Gatewood Bell had bought her as a yearling for $20,000 at the September sale, sent her to Eddie Woods as a 2-year-old, and I bought her for $100,000 at the April sale.” Still noticeably immature by the time of the sale, Follow No One showed some athleticism while working a quarter on synthetic in :21 1/5.

“Eddie thought she’d run through her conditions,” Rankin continued, “maybe get black type – which is exactly what happened [third in the Alma North Stakes at three]. She had some little things to work through, but she had some talent. It’s really exciting to have her get a really nice colt as her first foal.”

Upson Downs consigned Instant Coffee for Sagamore at last year’s September sale, and the dark brown colt brought $200,000 from Joe Hardoon, agent, and races for Gold Square LLC. “He won his maiden at Saratoga the week before the September sale,” Rankin recalled, which advertised the upside potential of his year-younger half-sister, a filly by Frosted (Tapit). Upson Downs sold their filly at the 2022 Keeneland September sale for $160,000 to HR Bloodstock.

Follow No One slipped to Speightstown (Gone West) but is in foal to Maclean’s Music (Distorted Humor) for 2023. A mate for next spring hasn’t been chosen.

the oracle has spoken: champions dream becomes the first stakes-winning colt from the first crop by justify

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champions dream, conor foley, jeff weiss, justify, nashua stakes, oracle bloodstock, rosedown racing

“This colt was kinda small when I bought him,” said pinhooker and consignor G.W. Parrish when I was inspecting the gray colt that he had purchased out of the 2021 Keeneland September sale and had trained up to working a quarter-mile for the OBS March sale in :20 4/5.

The colt had turned in a very good work, showing a stride length of 25.3 feet and earning a BreezeFig of 73. In addition the colt was speeding up through his work, attracting further notice for that as he worked around the turn.

In addition to a quick work, the colt was from the first crop by champion Justify (by Scat Daddy) and out of a graded stakes winner by Tapit. Even so, Parrish had acquired the colt for only $25,000 as a yearling.

“I brought him down here and put him in training, and he never missed a day, never did anything wrong,” Parrish continued. “He’s turned into a really nice colt.”

Most everyone else thought so too, and the gray son of Justify brought $425,000 from Rosedown Racing Stables, which is the entity owned by commercial real estate developer Jeffrey Weiss. The owner sent his new colt to trainer Danny Gargan, and the colt, named Champions Dream, won his debut going seven furlongs at Saratoga on Sept. 3 by 2 ¼ lengths.

Conor Foley of Oracle Bloodstock, along with his team, had selected the gray colt for Weiss at the March sale and said “he was one of the best horses in the sale. We loved him and were tickled to bits to get him for Jeff Weiss, although I was surprised by the price. I believe everyone expected him to go for more.

“Danny thought this was a nice colt very early, and Champions Dream then won his maiden at Saratoga comfortably, which is the right way.”

A month later, Champions Dream had a rough trip in the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes and finished fifth, but in his next start, on Saturday at Aqueduct for the G2 Nashua, Champions Dream was organized and on cue, winning his first stakes by three-quarters of a length over Full Moon Madness.

Bred in Kentucky by John Oxley, Champions Dream is the fifth stakes winner for Justify from a first crop of 176 foals. That represents 3 percent of his foals to date, but the achievement is most notable for a quartet being graded or group winners. Of the five, four are fillies; Champions Dream is the sire’s first stakes-winning colt, so far.

Justify’s first book of mares included about 40 major stakes winners and dozens of mares who had produced high-class racers from around the world. One of the quality racemares sent to Justify was Dancinginherdreams (Tapit), winner of the G2 Golden Rod Stakes at two. The elegant gray filly also ran second in the G2 Forward Gal and Davona Dale Stakes at Gulfstream but didn’t win another stakes.

Cast in the beautifully balanced mold of her distinguished sire Tapit, Dancinginherdreams was medium-sized and elegant, and her Justify colt was definitely in the type of his dam and Tapit. Having grown well over the winter, adding strength and standing about 15.3 as a 2-year-old in training, Champions Dream had the profile and phenotype of a miler who would develop well at two and possess the potential to be a challenger as a 3-year-old.

How different from his massively constructed sire Justify, who combines the immense strength and muscularity of broodmare sire Ghostzapper with the scope and height of Scat Daddy. Justify is a tank; Champions Dream is a sport vehicle.

That difference is not a bad thing. Champions Dream stood up to the rigors of early training and handled the preparation for the in-training sales well. He prospered under the Parrish Farms regimen and has continued to develop and improve over the summer in Gargan’s barn.

“Champions Dream showed Danny pretty early that this was an above-average colt,” Foley said, “and he keeps on doing things well. He’s going to Florida, gives us the feeling he’d like Gulfstream, and will be on the Derby trail. We’re all very excited for Jeff Weiss and his family to have a colt of this caliber.”

The future looks bright for this progressive young athlete, and if he proves as high-class and tough as Nashua himself, Champions Dream should bring a lot of smiles and dreams.

wests focus on the long game for their breeding and racing operation – stallions, mares, sales, and racing – with top advisers

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ben glass, gary west, mary west, sid fernando

The breeding and racing operation of Gary and Mary West combines racing and selling in a practical attempt to keep the stable on the profitable side of the ledger.

That is a major undertaking in any business, but breeding Thoroughbreds adds a couple extra degrees of difficulty. Yet, when breeders keep and race a colt like Maximum Security (by New Year’s Day), who won 10 of 14 races, earning $12.4 million, balancing the books seems much simpler.

Horses like Maximum Security, however, do not come along every year. In any operation.

So the results of the Grade 2 Fayette Handicap were a welcome way to end the meet. The Wests’ homebred West Will Power (Bernardini) was one of two winners on the card which clinched a first title as leading owners at Keeneland for the Wests. Earlier this year, they had tied with Juddmonte Farms for second among leading owners at the Churchill Downs spring meeting and had been the leading owners at Ellis Park’s meeting over the summer.

West Will Power had been second in a stakes at Ellis in his return from competition after 11 months on the sidelines, then won an allowance at Churchill. Trained this year by Brad Cox, West Will Power has won two of his three starts in 2022, and the Fayette was his first stakes victory.

A winner of his first two starts, West Will Power has now won five of his 12 starts, earning $525,230. Before the Fayette, the horse’s best effort had been a second in the G2 Iselin Handicap last year.

The 5-year-old bay comes from the crop immediately following the one that produced Maximum Security and was one of the colts the breeders elected to retain for their racing stable.

“Gary and Mary like to go to proven stallions,” noted one of the Wests’ advisers, Sid Fernando, “and going back six years to when we at Werk Thoroughbred Consultants helped plan the mating, Bernardini fit that mare best, according to our criteria, and we expected that he would be best at three and up.” And so he has proved.

To get the results that the Wests are aiming for, classic contenders year after year, requires consideration and long-term planning using the best bloodstock and advisers available.

To balance the challenges of mating and managing a sizable broodmare band and racing stable, the Wests have assembled a team of advisers and associates with decades of experience. Chief among these is their racing manager, Ben Glass, who is instrumental in selecting horses at the sales and then managing them for the Wests’ breeding and racing interests.

In addition, Fernando and Roger Lyons of Werk Thoroughbred Consultants assist the Wests and their racing manager with matings and auction recommendations.

Fernando noted that “in the last few years, Gary West has not been buying yearlings at Keeneland, like he had before. Instead, he has been concentrating on breeding more from his home stallions – Game Winner, West Coast, and Maximum Security – as well as well other top-tier sires.”

Among those horses the Wests have bred is leading 4-year-old Life is Good (Into Mischief), which they sold “because their primary focus is the 3-year-old classics, and the thought was that this colt would be better at eight to nine furlongs. They obviously liked him a lot and put a strong reserve on him, but he was such a good-looking prospect that China Horse Club and Maverick Racing (WinStar) bought him for $525,000,” Fernando recalled.

So, the Wests have bred a trio of high-class colts in successive crops, as well as buying Game Winner (Candy Ride) and racing him to a juvenile championship in 2018. The big dark bay now stands at Lane’s End and is one of the stallions that the Wests’ current approach is geared to supporting.

For earlier stallions, Glass purchased at auction the dams of Maximum Security and British Idiom for reasonable prices to breed to stallions New Year’s Day and Flashback, then sold the mares on at moderate prices. At the 2017 Keeneland January sale, the Wests sold Rose and Shine, in foal to Flashback, for $21,000 to Hargus and Sandra Sexton, and as a result British Idiom was not bred by the Wests. Nonetheless, they felt a strong rooting interest when the filly won the G1 Alcibiades Stakes and Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, then was named the Eclipse Award winner as champion juvenile filly for 2019.

What might be next, with stallions like Game Winner, West Coast, and Maximum Security to work with?

special is as special does: hard-luck broodmare earns her forever home with first-class racers

Tags

carrie brogden, david hayden, nocardioform placentitis, special me

Gina Romantica, winner of the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup, is the fourth graded stakes winner from her dam, the Unbridled’s Song mare Special Me. The daughter of Into Mischief (by Harlan’s Holiday) is the second Grade 1 winner from the mare. All of them were bred by Machmer Hall, Carrie Brogden, and Craig Brogden.

And yet, that these foals even exist is nearly a miracle. Their dam Special Me was born compromised by nocardioform placentitis, a particularly harmful infection of the placenta that frequently results in late-term loss of a pregnancy or a foal that is notably small or low weight.

Obviously, with Special Me, the pregnancy survived, but breeder David Hayden recalled, “She was an absolute midget.

“I know a lot of people wouldn’t keep a foal like that, especially one bred on a big stud fee,” Hayden said, and Unbridled’s Song stood for $125,000 live foal in 2005, the season that Special Me was conceived. “The vet said, ‘Leave the barn and I’ll take care of this.’ I said, ‘No. I can’t do that. We’re going to play it out.

“She was alive, jumped up and nursed right away, was okay if really small. I couldn’t put her down,” Hayden admitted.

That would have been the smart economic decision because Dark Hollow had to pay a big stud fee, then significant vet bills when the young filly ran into a fence and injured her left shoulder, and finally the continuing costs because Special Me couldn’t be sold because of her diminutive size, and when put into training, couldn’t have outrun me.

“Dave Hayden is the hero of the story,” Carrie Brogden said. “What he did for this mare was amazing. They took a terrible financial hit.”

When Special Me had raced unsuccessfully three times and had just turned three, “we’d had enough and put her in the Keeneland January sale in 2006,” Hayden said. “We knew going in, it was going to be big loss, but on the other side, we claimed the dam of Safely Kept for $11,000, and we’ve bred our share of good horses.

“We sold her as a broodmare prospect for $6,000, and full marks to Carrie for making it work,” Hayden concluded.

Even the Brogdens’ acquisition of Special Me wasn’t as straightforward as usual.

“We were ready to claim this mare before she went to the sale, and the trainer that we had to make the claim for us refused to do it,” Carrie recalled. “He said she was the size of a large pony, and he wasn’t joking.

“So we didn’t get her through a claim. Then we saw she was in the Keeneland January sale, and I went to look at her at David’s consignment. He told me all about the placentitis, and I looked at her, and I couldn’t resist. I love Unbridled’s Song mares.

“The only reason I found her Special Me was that I was specifically searching for Unbridled’s Song mares. That’s what led me to her at the racetrack, then at the sale.”

There was no question that the mare was severely compromised by the nocardioform placentitis. And although the disease did not affect this mare’s ability to produce good foals, Carrie voiced a caveat about buying other mares of this type: “We have bought four mares who were compromised as foals. Half worked out; half had small foals like themselves. But there’s only one Special Me.

“Eltimaas, the dam of [2016 champion sprinter] Drefong, and Special Me have funded our children’s educations and our home and operation. It’s an amazing experience.”

And normally, the Brogdens would have sold Special Me after her first or second stakes winner.

Carrie Brogden said, “We make our living by selling horses, and normally we sell on the update,” when a mare hits with a big runner, she goes to the sale. “But we had to keep Special Me because she’s a large pony … and now we just hope for a safe foaling” with the 16-year-old mare.

The happy owner-breeder said: “Special Me is about 14.2 but is a normal-bodied mare. Her genetics weren’t compromised the way that her body was, and she gets beautiful foals.

“When she’s done breeding, she’ll have a paddock here. This is her home.”

a pair of g1-winning juveniles are making arrogate’s legacy even more bittersweet

How soon they forget!

Had this year’s leading juveniles been switched with last year’s, what headlines would the papers be carrying? Over the weekend, a pair of juveniles by champion Arrogate (by Unbridled’s Song) won the Grade 1 features at Del Mar. A colt and a filly by the same sire taking Grade 1 honors? Has that happened before?

A year ago, minus a week or so, Gun Runner had Echo Zulu winning the Grade 1 Spinaway and Gunite winning the G1 Hopeful. The world stood agog, and Gun Runner began his ascent into the pantheon of stellar stallions.

Mavens of the horse world, however, are not as fickle as yesterday’s headlines. Not quite, anyway.

Gun Runner had first run with top juveniles, followed up with some excellent performers at three, and he is the toast of the Thoroughbred breeding and selling world. Poor Arrogate is gone, but at least he is not quite forgotten.

The winner of the Del Mar Futurity was Cave Rock, a dark brown, nearly black son of Arrogate bred in Kentucky by Anne and Ronnie Sheffer Racing LLC. The colt is out of G3 Schuylerville Stakes winner Georgie’s Angel, by Wood Memorial winner Bellamy Road, who also was a dark brown, nearly black racer of immense talent.

And there is no doubt about the talent in Cave Rock. The good-looking colt sold for $550,000 a year ago at the Keeneland September sale, purchased by Three Amigos Racing Stable, and Cave Rock races for Mike Pegram, Karl Watson, and Paul Weitman. The colt is trained by some neophyte named Baffert.

The latter name is also important in the saga of Cave Rock’s sire Arrogate. After Juddmonte Farms had purchased Arrogate and sent him to Baffert, the colt was showing hints of the talent typical of an Unbridled’s Song, but the trainer sent the colt back to the farm.

“He had some baby things going on and needed to finish growing up and fill out,” Juddmonte’s farm manager Garrett O’Rourke recalled, “and after some time playing and galloping on the farm, we sent him back to Bob. A few months later, Arrogate had his first start” in a maiden special at Santa Anita on April 17 of his 3-year-old season.

The rest is history.

In the Del Mar Futurity, Cave Rock indicated the level of form that Arrogate might have been able to show if his growth pattern had been a little different. The juvenile colt was away a step slow, then got into gear, and by the time the field had gone a quarter-mile, Cave Rock was slightly in front of his quick stablemate Havnameltdown (Uncaptured), who is owned by the same trio as the winner.

The pair staged something of an exhibition of speed with a quarter in :21.56, a half in :43.65, three-quarters in 1:08.55, and seven furlongs in 1:20.99. By the finish, Cave Rock had pulled away to win by 5 ¼ lengths, but it was impressive for both colts.

The previous day’s Del Mar Debutante was run in opposite fashion. The Arrogate filly And Tell Me Nolies was bumped at the start, was fifth of seven at the half, came wide on the outside at the turn, moved up to second by the stretch call, and won the race at the wire by a head. The winner’s time was 1:23.29.

Bred in Kentucky by Lara Run LLC, And Tell Me Nolies is out of the Exchange Rate mare Be Fair. The bay filly was sold for the first time at the 2021 Keeneland January sale for $70,000 to D.J. Stable, then resold at the 2022 OBS April sale for $230,000 to Bryan Anderson, agent. The filly races for Peter Redekop B.C. Ltd. and is trained by Peter Miller.

The dam of And Tell Me Nolies won the G3 Lake George Stakes at Saratoga, was third in the G1 Apple Blossom at Oaklawn, and showed improved form at three and four. Be Fair, in fact, was highly tried against the best fillies of her crop, finishing fourth or fifth in G1s such as the Ashland Stakes, Kentucky Oaks, Acorn, and Ruffian.

She clearly had some talent, and on retirement and carrying a first cover to leading sire Indian Charlie, she was sold at the 2011 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall sale for $300,000 to Dell Ridge. The mare sold at Keeneland November in 2018, carrying a foal by Practical Joke, for $50,000 to Lara Run.

Most recently, the then-15-year-old mare sold at the 2021 OBS winter sale, cataloged in foal to Gun Runner, for $35,000 to Jim Ballinger. The resulting foal was a colt who sold as a weanling at Keeneland November last year to McMahon & Hill Bloodstock for $150,000. Be Fair was bred to Mo Town in 2022.

In similar fashion to Be Fair, Georgie’s Angel, the dam of Cave Rock, sold before her G1 performer was known. The mare produced Cave Rock on March 12 and sold later that year at the 2020 Keeneland November mixed sale for $75,000 in foal to Arrogate. Georgie’s Angel produced a filly by Improbable this year, and she was bred back to Connect. The mare’s yearling, a full brother to Cave Rock, brought the top price at the Fasig-Tipton sale of select New York-breds, selling for $700,000 to Tom McCrocklin, agent for Champion Equine.

phipps family breeding is at the bottom of flightline’s ascent toward greatness

Tags

bobby spalding, feathered, flightline, jane lyon, lady pitt, ogden phipps, st elias, summer wind farm, Tapit

To win a race so impressively that it’s fleetingly compared to one of the great events, like Secretariat’s Belmont Stakes, is a major accomplishment for a racehorse and its owner and caretakers. To actually run a race that is comparable … boggles the mind.

Yet that is what Flightline did in the Grade 1 Pacific Classic on Saturday, Sept. 3.

In winning the race by 19 ¼ lengths in 1:59.28, the dark bay son of Tapit (by Pulpit) ran his unbeaten career race record to five and added a third G1 to previous top-level victories in the Malibu and Metropolitan Handicap.

A $1 million sale yearling from Fasig-Tipton‘s Saratoga sale from three years ago, Flightline was bred in Kentucky by Jane Lyon’s Summer Wind Farm and is an athletic son of one of the farm’s premium producers, Feathered, herself a daughter of leading sire and broodmare sire Indian Charlie (In Excess) and Receipt (Dynaformer).

Summer Wind’s farm manager, Bobby Spalding, said that “Flightline was always a nice, level-headed colt who impressed you with his natural athleticism, but when you’re watching them grow up, you don’t know that one of them is going to win a Grade 1 by nearly 20 lengths. That’s just amazing!

“[Trainer] John Sadler has done a marvelous job with this colt, and he’s grown up to be a grand individual. I think they said he was 16.2. His mamma’s only just 16 hands, maybe, but she’s the kind of mare that I like, not too big, not out of proportion anywhere. Just real nice, and this is a wonderful family,” Spalding concluded.

This is a wonderful family, full of high-quality racehorses and producers, that had been in the hands of the Phipps family from the mid-1960s.

The Phipps patriarch Ogden Phipps, breeder and owner of champion Buckpasser, was always open to freshening the broodmare band and took the opportunity to purchase 1966 champion 3-year-old filly Lady Pitt (Sword Dancer). A winner of the Coaching Club American Oaks, Delaware Oaks, and Mother Goose, Lady Pitt was a medium-sized chestnut more notable for toughness than brilliant speed. Bred in Kentucky by John W. Greathouse, Lady Pitt was a stakes winner at two, but she came into a higher level of form at three, finishing first in six races, including the Alabama (disqualified to second for bearing in on second-place Natashka).

The daughter of 1959 Belmont Stakes winner Sword Dancer was elected champion of her division over Natashka (Dedicate) and Phipps’s Destro (Ribot), and the great racing commentator Charlie Hatton noted that Phipps thought Lady Pitt deserved the award due to her consistency, being in the money 12 times from 16 starts. She stood 15.3 hands at the end of her 3-year-old season.

The owner-breeder stood behind his assessment and added the mare to his broodmare portfolio at Claiborne Farm when the opportunity came. Bred to Buckpasser, Lady Pitt produced Bank of England in 1970, and she is the ancestress of the four-time Grade 1 winner and 2022 freshman sire Oscar Performance (Kitten’s Joy). Six years later, Lady Pitt foaled the notably talented Blitey (Riva Ridge).

A winner of the Test, Ballerina, and Maskette before any of those three were elevated to Grade 1 races, Blitey produced the highly accomplished Dancing Spree (Nijinsky), who won Grade 1s at six furlongs (Breeders’ Cup Sprint), seven furlongs (Carter), and 10 furlongs (Suburban). His full sisters were Grade 2 winner Dancing All Night and Oh What a Dance, the dam of champion Heavenly Cause (Seeking the Gold).

A half-sister to this trio was Fantastic Find (Mr. Prospector), who won the G1 Hempstead and was second in the G1 Test and Ballerina after they went to the top-level designation. Fantastic Find is the fourth dam of Flightline through her daughter Finder’s Fee (Storm Cat), winner of the G1 Matron at two, the G1 Acorn at three.

A major disappointment as a producer, Finder’s Fee did not produce a stakes winner, but the mare’s most successful racer, stakes-placed Receipt, is the second dam of Flightline.

Receipt was third in a listed stakes at Saratoga, as well as fourth in a Grade 2 there, but her branch of the family might have appeared to be going stale, because the Phipps Stable chose to sell her, in foal to Indian Charlie, at the 2012 Keeneland January sale. The mare brought $350,000 from St. Elias Stable. Five months later, she produced Feathered.

Bred by Teresa Viola Racing Stable, Feathered was a May foal, like much of this family, but nonetheless was progressive enough to be a featured prospect at the 2014 OBS March sale from the late J.J. Crupi’s New Castle Farm, agent, and sold for $300,000 to Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners.

Feathered won her second start, a maiden special at Saratoga, then showed high form in a trio of Grade 1 races, finishing third in the Frizette, fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, and second in the Hollywood Starlet.

The following season, Feathered won a couple more races, including the G3 Edgewood Stakes at Churchill Downs, and ran second in the G1 American Oaks. Retired and sent to leading sire War Front (Danzig), Feathered was sold through the 2016 Keeneland November sale, with Hill ‘n’ Dale Sales as agent, for $2.35 million to Summer Wind.

The mare’s first foal was the bay filly Good on Paper, a winner at three who earned $52,940. She was sold privately before racing to Glen Hill Farm.

The second foal out of Feathered was Flightline.

Feathered has a 2-year-old full brother to Flightline named Olivier, who was a $390,000 RNA at the 2021 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale. The colt most recently worked at Keeneland on Sept. 3 (five furlongs in 1:02.2) and has been retained in a partnership. Feathered has a yearling colt by Curlin (Smart Strike), a filly at side foaled on May 17 by Into Mischief (Harlan’s Holiday), and was bred to Tapit.

Spalding said that the initial thought “had been to leave Feathered open and breed the next year, but Mrs. Lyon asked about sending her to Tapit. We only had time for a single cover, but she had the right idea. Unfortunately, the mare did not get in foal.”

Flightline is one of 95 Northern Hemisphere-bred graded winners for Tapit and one of 152 black-type winners for the three-time national leading sire, who stands at Gainesway.