Last Saturday, No Parole became just the eighth horse bred in Louisiana to win a Grade 1 race when he dominated the Woody Stephens at Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y. That the colt did it in particularly impressive style was just the icing on the cake for first-time Grade 1-winning breeders Keith and Ginger Myers.
The proprietors of Coteau Grove Farm in Sunset, La., may not have watched the race live, but they were beyond thrilled to see their years of patience and faith in good people rewarded at the sport's top levels.
One of those good people is bloodstock agent Andrew Cary, employed by the Myers' since 2014. In fact, No Parole's dam, Plus One, was only the second mare Cary purchased for the couple, plucking her out of the 2014 Keeneland November sale for $67,000.
“I actually spotted her in the back ring, and it was just kind of one of those things when you see a horse and they blow you away with how they look,” Cary explained. “She had a lot of presence, and I love fast, hard-knocking stakes mares. I also liked Bluegrass Cat as kind of an under-the-radar broodmare sire, and she was out of a good family of just good, hard-knocking race mares.”
The stakes-winning Plus One was in foal to Violence at the sale, and her colt born the following spring brought $85,000 as a weanling back at Keeneland. Subsequently named Violent Ways, the colt won a trio of allowance races in Louisiana.
Plus One was bred back to Songandaprayer in the Louisiana program the following spring, but Cary and the Myers' had liked her first Violence colt so much that they bred her back to him for 2017.
Maggi Moss, a long-time supporter of the Louisiana racing program, purchased the yearling No Parole for $75,000 at the 2018 Keeneland September sale.
“We were thrilled Maggi bought him, because we knew she understands the Louisiana program and he'd be given every chance to succeed,” Cary said.
No Parole as a weanling
His first few starts were particularly impressive, winning by double-digit lengths in Louisiana-bred company at the Fair Grounds in December and January.
No Parole stepped up to win the Louisiana-Bred Premier Night Prince Stakes at Delta Downs in his third start, but struggled in the step up in distance when tried in the G2 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn, finishing eighth. Trainer Tom Amoss immediately took the colt back to sprint distances, and he won an allowance race at Churchill before winning the G1 Woody Stephens by 3 3/4 lengths.
“It's pretty special for me personally,” Cary said. “It's the first Grade 1 winner I've had where I purchased the mare and picked the mating, so it's very gratifying to see her go on and produce a horse like this. I would go see him in Louisiana every five to six weeks, and my best friend Jay Goodwin prepped him for the sale in Lexington, so I really got to see him grow up.
“After Maggi bought him, he was started by my friends the Gladwells before he went to Amoss, so there have been a lot of really good people associated with this horse all the way through.”
As for Plus One, she foaled a filly by Connect that will head to the Keeneland September sale this year, and she is currently pregnant to the cover of Curlin. Cary and the Myers are definitely looking forward to what she can do next.
“It's just so cool to see her become a big-time producer,” Cary said.
The Myers had previously enjoyed good success in the state of Louisiana since launching their racing and breeding program in 2008. Their homebred Little Ms Protocol is one of the top 20 Louisiana-bred earners in history, racking up $731,290 over her 30-start career, and another homebred, Harlie's Dreams, earned just shy of $400,000 in their colors.
But it was another home-grown project that changed the trajectory of the Myers' racing interests. Their LHC Group, which Ginger Myers launched in the couple's Louisiana kitchen in 1997, was growing exponentially, and they found themselves with less time to enjoy making it to the races to watch their horses run.
Enter Louisiana legend Jake Delhomme. The Louisiana-born NFL quarterback is a friend of the Myers family and a fellow horse racing enthusiast. Cary ran into Delhomme at the sales about 12 years ago and developed a friendship as well, so when Keith Myers was looking for an agent to help transition his program in 2014, Delhomme made the connection to Cary.
“Mr. Myers called and we hit it off,” said Cary. “They'd had a lot of fun with racing, but they were getting to a point with their business that they were just getting busy and couldn't go to the track as much. He wanted to get more involved with breeding; they really enjoyed seeing the babies born on the farm and wanted to do more of that.
“We talked about where his program was, where he wanted to go, and how to get him there. I flew down and looked at the 15 horses in training and 10 mares, evaluated them. We started by selling off some racing stock and adding better mares, and now we're up to 30 mares and had 25 foals this year.”
Primarily, the Myers breed commercially, though they'll keep and race a promising filly or two if they own the female family to be able to take advantage of multiple updates.
“They really want to do everything the right way, and they put a lot of time and money into the business so it's good to see that rewarded,” Cary said.
Cary had also seen Grade 1 success prior to No Parole, but it wasn't quite as personal. As a founding partner in Select Sales, Cary was involved with horses like Tepin, Sharp Azteca, and Promises Fulfilled, but the now-solo bloodstock agent's association with No Parole is just a little bit sweeter.
“He's such a talented horse,” Cary said. “It's so awesome to watch how fast he can go, and he makes it look pretty easy. I'm excited to see what he'll do next.”
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