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West Will Power Will Stand at Stud in Korea

Ben Glass, the stable manager for Gary and Mary West, has reported that GI Stephen Foster S. winner West Will Power (Bernardini–Wild Promises, by Wild Event) has been sold to a Korean farm, where he will stand at stud next year.

Glass said the deal was brokered by bloodstock agent Jun Park. Glass did not know what farm had bought West Will Power, but according to a Tweet from Korea Racing his new home will be Songma Farm.

On July 1, West Will Power picked up the biggest victory of his career, winning the GI Stephen Foster S. by a half-length, picking up his first Grade I win in the process. Afterward, however, he suffered a soft tissue injury and his retirement was announced in early August.

“He had an injury after that race, I believe in his left front pastern,” Glass said. “Dr. (Larry) Bramlage said it would take considerable time to heal, if it would heal at all. We didn't want to bring him back as a 7-year-old and maybe hurt him. He ran so well for us and was a homebred, so we decided the best thing to do was to retire him.”

Trained by Brad Cox, West Will Power was 7-for-17 during his career and earned $1,745,390. He also won the GII New Orleans Classic S. and the GII Hagyard Fayette S.

“He had a very nice career and that he's a homebred made it even nicer,” Glass said. “That's because we got the breeders' awards. We were really happy with him and the career he had.”

Glass said he tried to find a U.S. stallion farm that would agree to take West Will Power, but was unsuccessful.

“Sadly, Kentucky farms did not reach out to us and I tried quite a few,” he said. “I think with his age, being six, that probably stopped most of them. I tried hard to sell him throughout the whole United States. If this injury had happened earlier in his life I think we would have found a home for him here. But with his being six, then breeding at seven, his first foals would have been born when he was eight and wouldn't have run until he was 10. That's one of the reasons there wasn't a great deal of interest.”

The Wests have sent other stallions to Korea, including Concert Tour (Street Sense), the winner of the 2021 GII Rebel S. and the 2021 San Vicente S.

“We've sent a couple other horses to Korea,” Glass said. “We get pictures back and they just look gorgeous. They take great care of them and they are really coming on when it comes to their breeding program.”

The post West Will Power Will Stand at Stud in Korea appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Keeneland November Sale To Feature Draft Of Mares From Gary And Mary West

Keeneland has announced that the 2021 November Breeding Stock Sale, from Nov. 10-19, will mark the start of an annual reduction of broodmares from prominent owners and breeders Gary and Mary West during the auction.

Paramount Sales will serve as agent for the consignment, which this year will catalog 31 broodmares and broodmare prospects with broodmares in foal to Hard Spun, Union Rags and The Factor, as well as to the Wests' champions Game Winner, Maximum Security and West Coast and Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed American Freedom.

As the Wests' colts and their Breeders' Cup Juvenile winner New Year's Day were retired to stud, the couple acquired a large number of mares specifically to breed to them.

“We just can't keep them all,” Ben Glass, the Wests' Racing Manager, said about the mares. “It's amazing how quickly we accumulated broodmares. We're up to 100, and we only try to have 50-60. You just have to move those mares down the line. It's a tough decision. For all we know, we're selling the dam of another Grade 1 winner.”

The mares cataloged as part of the Wests' annual reduction represent a diversity of bloodlines, providing breeders with a variety of options for future matings. Included among the sires of their mares are prominent stallions and/or top broodmare sires Candy Ride (ARG), Curlin, Distorted Humor, Giant's Causeway, Into Mischief, Macho Uno, Medaglia d'Oro, Mineshaft, Quality Road, Smart Strike, Speightstown, Storm Cat, Street Cry (IRE) and Uncle Mo.

The Wests have been longtime patrons of Keeneland sales.

They purchased Maximum Security's sire, New Year's Day, at Keeneland's 2012 September Yearling Sale. They purchased the champion's dam, Lil Indy, in foal to Pioneerof the Nile at the 2014 January Horses of All Ages Sale and resold her carrying a full sister to Maximum Security at the 2018 November Sale.

The Wests also acquired American Freedom, Game Winner and West Coast at the September Sale, along with Dream Lady, who produced their G1 Central Bank Ashland dead-heat winner Room Service.

Glass said the choice of the November Sale as the venue for the Wests' annual reduction of broodmares stemmed from their working relationship with Keeneland and the sales company's broad international buying base.

“We have a good working relationship with Keeneland,” Glass said. “They have always done a good job for us. There is a buyer there for every mare.”

While each mare cataloged to this year's November Sale has a lot to offer, Paramount's Pat Costello said several have attributes that will attract enhanced attention from buyers:

Sweet Sweet Annie (Hip 684), a 6-year-old mare by Curlin produced from multiple stakes winner Song for Annie and in foal to West Coast, is a half-sister to multiple stakes winner Successful Song.
Applaud (Hip 751), a 3-year-old daughter of Medaglia d'Oro also is in foal to West Coast.
Media Circus (Hip 948), a 3-year-old by Mineshaft, descends from the female family of Grade 1 winner and sire Tapizar.

“Sweet Sweet Annie is a fine mare with good size and is from a hell of a family,” Costello said. “Applaud is a lovely individual from a real deep family that goes back to Hold That Tiger and Editor's Note. Media Circus is also another nice mare, and she is from the family of Tapizar.”

Costello reiterated that the Wests are trying to trim their numbers with the reduction.

“They can't keep them all.” Costello said. “They have a tremendous broodmare band and have fillies they race coming off the track and adding to it.”

“The Wests are passionate Thoroughbred owners and breeders, who have been very loyal patrons of Keeneland and have realized some of their greatest triumphs in racing thanks to horses they acquired here,” Keeneland Vice President of Sales Tony Lacy said. “We are grateful for the opportunity to annually offer mares from such a successful operation as an added attraction of the November Sale.”

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Gary & Mary West to Reduce Broodmare Band at Keeneland November

Prominent owner/breeders Gary and Mary West will begin an annual reduction of their broodmare band at Keeneland November starting with the 2021 sale. With Paramount Sales consigning, the Wests will offer 31 broodmares and broodmares prospects at this November's auction. Mares will be offered in foal to Hard Spun, Union Rags and The Factor, as well as to the Wests' champions Game Winner, Maximum Security and West Coast and Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed American Freedom.

The Wests had acquired a significant number of mares in past years to support their colts who were going off to stud.

“We just can't keep them all,” said racing and bloodstock advisor Ben Glass. “It's amazing how quickly we accumulated broodmares. We're up to 100, and we only try to have 50-60. You just have to move those mares down the line. It's a tough decision. For all we know, we're selling the dam of another Grade I winner.”

The Wests have been longtime patrons of Keeneland, acquiring many of their stand-out runners at the September yearling sale, including American Freedom, Game Winner and West Coast. They purchased Maximum Security's GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile-winning sire New Year's Day for $425,000 at KEESEP '12, and his dam Lil Indy (Anasheed) for $80,000 at the 2014 Keeneland January sale while in foal to Pioneerof the Nile.

“We have a good working relationship with Keeneland,” Glass said. “They have always done a good job for us. There is a buyer there for every mare.”

Among the Paramount-consigned West offerings at Keeneland November will be Sweet Sweet Annie (Curlin, hip 684), a daughter of MSW Song for Annie (Sultry Song) and half to MSW/MGSP Successful Song (Successful Appeal) offered in foal to West Coast; 3-year-old Applaud (Medaglia d'Oro, hip 751), also in foal to West Coast; and Media Circus (Mineshaft, hip 948), another 3-year-old who hails from the deep female family of Olympio, Tapizar, etc.

“Sweet Sweet Annie is a fine mare with good size and is from a hell of a family,” Paramount's Pat Costello said. “Applaud is a lovely individual from a real deep family that goes back to Hold That Tiger and Editor's Note. Media Circus is also another nice mare, and she is from the family of Tapizar.”

Keeneland Vice President of Sales Tony Lacy said, “The Wests are passionate Thoroughbred owners and breeders, who have been very loyal patrons of Keeneland and have realized some of their greatest triumphs in racing thanks to horses they acquired here. We are grateful for the opportunity to annually offer mares from such a successful operation as an added attraction of the November Sale.”

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Bloodlines Presented By Mill Ridge Farm: Concert Tour Flies The Homebred Banner For Wests

There is a tide in the affairs of horses, which taken at the flood, leads on to the Kentucky Derby.

With apologies to Shakespeare, there's more than a grain of truth in that sentence. Breeders begin the quest for the classics with purchases, sometimes quite expensive ones. Then come attempts at the major races and the stages of building a breeding operation to produce young prospects for the classics. If allied with confident planning, nerve, and patience, breeders have the potential to flower a breeding program that produces classic prospects with some regularity.

Such is the case with Gary and Mary West.

In 2019, the West stable had a pair of classic prospects, one on each coast, and both made it to the Kentucky Derby. Unbeaten in four previous starts, their homebred Maximum Security (by New Year's Day) wintered in Florida, won the Grade 1 Florida Derby, and led the field past the wire in the 2019 Kentucky Derby. Although subsequently disqualified, Maximum Security was named champion of his division for the annual Eclipse Award.

In the same classic, the Wests' other Derby performer was the 2018 juvenile champion Game Winner (Candy Ride), based in California with trainer Bob Baffert. Although beaten in the Kentucky Derby, Game Winner had the scope and ability of a classic colt. The dark bay had been bred by Summer Wind Farm in Kentucky and sold to the Wests for $110,000 at the Keeneland September sale in 2017.

This year, the Wests again are closely connected to a pair of colts prepping for the classics. The first is one that they sold; the Into Mischief colt Life is Good, who is unbeaten in three starts, was auctioned to China Horse Club and Maverick Racing for $525,000 at the 2019 Keeneland September sale.

The colt that the Wests kept is Concert Tour (by Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense), who is likewise unbeaten in three starts, including the G2 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn on March 13. Bred in Kentucky by Gary and Mary West Stables Inc., Concert Tour is out of the Tapit mare Purse Strings.

The Wests bought Purse Strings through their racing manager and bloodstock representative Ben Glass for $240,000 at the 2012 Keeneland September yearling sale. At the races, Purse Strings raced a dozen times in maiden special company, winning the last of those at Churchill Downs on Nov. 29 as a 4-year-old. Glass recalled that Purse Strings “had all the talent in the world and should have broken her maiden a half-dozen times. But she was never fully sound,” he said.

Instead, “she always had little problems: a shin, a suspensory, and so forth that kept her from being early to the races and from staying in hard training so she could show her best.”

A winner of $105,960, Purse Strings had contested a series of good maiden races, finishing second a half-dozen times and third twice before graduating to the winner's circle. Sent to the paddocks for the 2016 breeding season, Purse Strings produced Concert Tour as her second foal.

The chestnut Purse Strings was notably the best racer from her dam, the Mt. Livermore mare My Red Porsche, who is a half-sister to the stakes winner, My White Corvette (Tarr Road). The latter produced champion Stardom Bound from the first crop by Tapit (Pulpit), and that gray filly's five Grade 1 successes prompted a mating between My Red Porsche and the great sire.

The result was Purse Strings, and even with physical issues, she clearly was a useful filly and has passed on more than that to her progressive son Concert Tour. The mare has a yearling colt by champion Lookin at Lucky and is in foal to American Freedom (Pulpit), who won the G3 Iowa Derby, was second in both the G1 Haskell and Travers, and is now a stallion at Airdrie Stud in Kentucky. Due in mid-April, Purse Strings will be bred back to Street Sense.

To produce horses of this caliber with consistency, the Wests and their advisers are responsible for balancing optimism and pragmatism, for considering both physique and pedigree. The responsibilities for all this are considerable. Pedigree adviser Sid Fernando noted that “Werk Thoroughbred Consultants advises on matings, and we're happy to be part of the team for Gary and Mary West, Ben Glass, and their other elite support staff.”

One of the benefits of managing well the many facets of breeding racehorses is the satisfaction when the results go as planned.

A birth notice of note: Beach Walk, the dam of unbeaten Life is Good, foaled a half-brother by Candy Ride on March 15. The mare will be bred back to Into Mischief, the sire of Life is Good.

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