Those two representatives of Juddmonte and Darley respectively live within a mile of each other as the crow flies over the stud farms encircling Newmarket. Add to that mighty pair the names of Kingman (GB) at £125,000 and Baaeed (GB) at £80,000, and you have four of the top ten European stallions by price all within that square mile of excellence. 

It's not all about Newmarket, of course, with the Aga Khan Studs standing the most expensive stallion in France, Siyouni (Fr), at €200,000, the same fee commanded by their Sea The Stars (Ire) in Ireland, where he matches Wootton Bassett (GB), who heads the Coolmore roster. The lucky ones among us were those who jumped aboard the Siyouni and Wootton Bassett supporters' buses when those two stallions started out at €7,000 and €6,000 respectively. In bloodstock, as in life, there's a lot to be said for those who have carved out their own lofty niches from humble origins. 

Of course, with this level of sire power, one needs a mare of equally high standing, whether on the racecourse or as a producer or both. Many of the resulting offspring are retained to race by major owner-breeders, and those that do make it to the sales ring can be expected to fetch the level of return that could make even these high fees look good value. It's all relative. 

Dependable

At a more reachable level for many breeders comes this dependable trio – two we can most certainly call stalwarts and one who stamped his presence on the business with his first few crops. 

We discussed Yeomanstown Stud's Dark Angel (Ire) in greater depth in TDN last August. For 2024, he remains at €60,000, which was his fee for the preceding three seasons and down from three years at €85,000 between 2018 and 2020. Admittedly, his yearling sales average, which was in six figures for seven straight seasons, has dipped a little in the last few years and to a certain degree he is perhaps a victim of his own success, with various sons and other younger stallions of a similar profile encroaching on this popular sprinter/miler territory. But he had 77 yearlings sold at an average of £88,637 in 2023 which isn't bad going and, now 19, he was also third in the general sires' table behind Frankel and Dubawi.

From one O'Callaghan family farm to another, we switch to Tally-Ho Stud. At 23, Kodiac (GB) is into veteran territory but he is also at his lowest fee for nine years at €35,000. You pretty much know what you're going to get with him because he's been there, done that, siring plenty of fast colts and fillies and regularly providing the highest number of winners in a season. He hasn't lost his touch, as demonstrated last year by his Group 1-winning son and now stable-mate Good Guess (GB) and the G2 Lowther S. winner Relief Rally (Ire).

Before Good Guess gets a shot at the title, the most credible threat to Kodiac's crown within the Tally-Ho empire comes from Mehmas (Ire), who tore up the first-season sire record books in 2020 and has continued to build on that great start. His European results are backed up by some notable success in America, which should put his sales stock, whether as yearlings or horses in training, on the radar of a wider range of buyers, and at €50,000 in 2024, his fee has come down from last year's high of €60,000. 

His two-year-olds of this year were conceived in his first book after that break-out season of 2020, so we can expect the level of of his mates that year to have risen in line with his fee. That is not always a guarantee of increased success but I wouldn't want to bet against Mehmas continuing to be one of the most exciting younger sires in the European ranks. His equable temperament, and that of many of his offspring, appears to be what sets him apart.

Versatile

If you're looking for a stallion with the potential to get you a Classic winner at a mid-level price then the names of Teofilo (Ire) at €30,000, Sea The Moon (Ger) at £32,500, and Galiway (GB) at €30,000 should all be considered.

It would be wrong to compartmentalise Teofilo as a staying stallion, though he is very good at that, as his Melbourne Cup-winning sons Without A Fight (Ire), Twilight Payment (Ire) and Cross Counter (GB) show, not to mention the Ascot Gold Cup winner Subjectivist (GB). But there is much more in Teofilo's playbook than that, and he remains a hugely dependable sire across the distances, and of fillies too, from the Irish 1,000 Guineas winner Pleascach (Ire) to Irish St Leger winner Voleuse De Coeurs (Ire). If you also factor in some of his achievements as a broodmare sire – Coroebus (Ire), Mac Swiney (Ire), Cachet (Ire) and Dreamloper (Ire) are among the Group 1 winners in that category – and a case can be made for Teofilo being an elite sire at a much more affordable fee than some in that category. 

Sea The Moon has defied the level of commercial acceptability usually granted to winners of the Deutsches Derby and throughout his career to date has posted very consistent sales returns via his yearlings. His fee has remained sensible – starting at £15,000 for the first six seasons, and then rising steadily to £22,500, then £25,000 and to his current high of £32,500. No doubt helped by the fact that he tends to get very good-looking stock, Sea The Moon has a following in both hemispheres despite never having left Lanwades since retiring to stud, and he coasts into 2024 having sired the winners of the equivalents of the Derby and the Oaks in his native Germany, where he is the champion sire.

Climbing up the ranks in France is Galiway, whose two Group 1 winners are the full-brothers Sealiway (Fr), who was also busy last year at Haras de Beaumont, and Classic prospect Sunway (Fr). We can perhaps expect Galiway to make as much of an impact at the Cheltenham Festival as he may do at Chantilly or Epsom, and that has increased his appeal to the National Hunt crowd, with another of his sons, Kenway (Fr), having recently joined Coolagown Stud in Ireland. 

But it is the Flat with which we are chiefly concerned here, and Galiway's French yearling results last year – six sold at Arqana in August for an average of €131,667 and 23 in October for a €44,761 average, all from his 2021 fee of €12,000 fee – make him a stallion worthy of closer attention. Since 2021, his price has increased to €30,000.

The Next Step

This year is a critical one for the two young stallions who made the biggest impression with their first-crop runners in 2023. Understandably, both Blue Point (Ire) and Too Darn Hot (GB) have been given fee increases, the former from €35,000 to €60,000 and the latter from £40,000 to £65,000. Getting a mare in to either of these Darley stallions might have been the toughest first challenge for the many breeders who wanted to use them at their higher fees. There is plenty of sales-ring and some racecourse evidence to back up those decisions, and a Group 1-winning three-year-old, preferably a Classic winner, will be required to keep these reputations soaring.

A year ahead of them is Coolmore's Sioux Nation, whose juveniles of this year were conceived at his lowest fee of €10,000. He is now at €27,500 thanks to the exploits of the hugely likeable Brave Emperor (Ire) and Matilda Picotte (Ire) among his 10 Group winners from his two crops of runners to race. Sioux Nation was third in the second-season sires' table last year behind Ace Impact's sire Cracksman (GB) and Havana Grey (GB), and while the latter had the highest number of black-type winners (11), Sioux Nation was represented by the most Group winners of this intake (7). He is definitely a horse to watch, even though his fee has increased by €10,000 in the last year.

Everything to Prove

I'm going to pitch in two names here who are teetering on the brink of triumph or disaster. That's not actually true, of course, but such is the knee-jerk reaction to the early results of stallions by industry people who really should know better, that some horses can be commercially 'dead' before we have even had a proper chance to see what they can do. If mass desertion by breeders follows then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that the stallion will fail, sometimes through no actual fault of his own, other than the fact that he is unlikely to get you a Brocklesby winner. 

Anyway, as I climb down off my soapbox for the umpteenth time with the fading hope that folks will just wait'n'see awhile, I will put forward Ghaiyyath (Ire) at €25,000 and Hello Youmzain (Fr) at €22,500 as two of the more interesting names among those with first runners in 2024. 

A dual Group 1-winning son of Kodiac, Hello Youmzain's yearlings were in demand in Deauville last year and he must be odds-on to be France's leading first-season sire this year. He covered 140 mares in his first season at Haras d'Etreham at his opening fee of €25,000.

Ghaiyyath's fee has also been trimmed slightly from his starting point of €30,000. Not all sons of Dubawi are created equal, of course, and there is now no shortage of them at stud, but Night Of Thunder (Ire), bred on the same cross as the 130-rated Ghaiyyath, and Too Darn Hot, bred on a similar cross, have set the bar high. 

Both Hello Youmzain and Ghaiyyath became Group winners themselves for the first time in the second half of their juvenile seasons. If their offspring can follow suit, it is easy to imagine that both stallions could be more expensive by this time next year.

TDN Value Podium

Bronze: Acclamation (GB), Rathbarry Stud, €25,000

If we are spruiking Dark Angel and Mehmas in this piece, then we must have their sire on the podium. At 25, Acclamation is still going strong and is an increasingly significant influence. As last year's G1 Hong Kong Cup and G1 Cox Plate winner Romantic Warrior (Ire) showed, he is far from just a one-trick pony, though he is obviously best known as a sire of sprinters, with the brilliant Marsha (Ire) among them. Al Shaqab's Orne (Ire), who was bred at home by Rathbarry, has Classic claims ahead of this season, and with Acclamation's fee sliding down from his career-high of €40,000 in 2018 and 2019, he's very much still one to keep on your side. 

Silver: Pinatubo (Ire), Dalham Hall Stud, £35,000

Perhaps boosted by the success of his fellow son of Shamardal, Blue Point, last year, Pinatubo seems to be many people's idea of this season's leading freshman in waiting. If you had the chance to see him last week during Darley's open days, then it would be hard to disagree, as he has swagger and substance in spades. 

His yearling average of almost £154,000 for 41 sold tells of his commercial popularity to date. It's up to him now, and up his sleeve he has the fact that he is from the same family as Invincible Spirit and Kodiac. 

Pinatubo has remained at £35,000 throughout his stud career and that could look very reasonable if his stock live up to expectations this year. 

Gold: Sottsass (Fr), Coolmore, €25,000

We hear a lot about 'stallion-making races' and I'm not sure I believe in the concept, but all we need to know about Sottsass is that he won the G1 Prix du Jockey Club and the G1 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe – two races that most owners would give their eyeteeth to win – not to mention the G1 Prix Ganay and G2 Prix Niel. He was also third in the Arc as a three-year-old behind the older horses Waldgeist (GB) and Enable (GB).

Sottsass is from one of the current 'it' families, with his half-siblings including the stellar Sistercharlie (Ire) and My Sister Nat (Fr), while full-brother Shin Emperor (Fr) looks a Grade 1, or even Classic, winner in the making in Japan this year.

He is the first cab off the rank when it comes to Coolmore's sons of Siyouni (Fr). In general, his first yearlings looked athletic and together, and they may raise a few eyebrows by coming to hand sooner than expected. More importantly, however, they should go on, and as we know, it's best to rely on a Classic winner to get you a Classic winner.

The post Value Sires Part IV: It’s All Relative appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

Unlike America, the foal crop in Britain and Ireland has been gently on the rise in recent years, up to 13,438 in 2023, compared to 12,778 in 2020, though within that combined number for last year, the Irish crop rose by 4% to 9,082 while the British number was down by 4% at 4,356. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues this year.

Those behind the stallions will be all too aware of the dilemma faced by some of their clients. In Monday's TDN, Coolmore's Mark Byrne said, “Now more so than ever breeders will need to steady the ship and use the good stallions that they can afford.” 

As we discussed in Part II of this series, which looked at stallions under the £/€10,000 mark, for those attempting to breed commercially and second-guess which way the winds of fashion and favour will blow, it truly is a game of chance. As we go up another tier in price, we will try to offer some perspective on both up-and-coming and established stallions which could offer value. This will not include any of the stallions standing their first season this year who were dealt with in Part I of the series.

Proven sires

While for many breeders the Juddmonte high-flyers of Frankel (GB) and Kingman (GB) are out of reach, it is hard to look past two stalwarts of the roster in this division. Bated Breath (GB) had a quieter year in 2023 by his own standards but he has the offspring of his strongest crop on paper to run for him this year and he's a stallion we will surely be hearing plenty more from. Having spent a couple of years at £15,000, he is back down to £10,000 and when considering his yearling average in 2023, of £48,300 for 60 sold, this does look a very workable price for a horse who generally gets good-looking sprinter-milers.

Then there is his fellow resident Oasis Dream (GB), who has been a friend to the British breeding industry for 20 years now and last year had a yearling average of just over £55,000. Yes, he's 24, but at his lowest fee of £15,000 (his career high having been £85,000 ten years ago) he's a decent choice to get a young mare off to a good start. We all know what Oasis Dream can do: his best horses among his 18 Group/Grade 1 winners include his champion two-year-old son Native Trail (GB), who has recently retired to Kildangan Stud, the brilliant Midday (GB) and top sprinter Muhaarar (GB). Oasis Dream is versatile as a sire and increasingly influential as a broodmare sire – from brilliant juvenile sprinter Big Evs (Ire) (Blue Point {Ire}) to talented stayer Quickthorn (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}). 

And that brings us to Nathaniel, who some now seem to consider a National Hunt sire but that's sheer madness. With a Derby winner and an Oaks winner already in his portfolio, Nathaniel added another two Group 1 winners to his list last year in the Champion Fillies and Mares S. winner Poptronic (GB) and the aforementioned Quickthorn. Both of these horses raced for their breeders, and I guess Nathaniel has a proper owner-breeder profile, but look at how the Blunts and the Blyths have been rewarded for their patience: Poptronic was sold for 1.4 million gns after her Champions' Day success, having also racked up racecourse earnings of £459,815, and Quickthorn has earnings knocking on the door of £800,000.

Nathaniel's fee has gone up again a little this year. After spending three years at £15,000, he is now back at £17,500, but he's still worth it. 

Golden Horn (GB) is another with a National Hunt label around his neck since his move to Overbury Stud but again, if you're an owner-breeder with a bit of patience, he really should not be forgotten. Admittedly, it remains a disappointment that from his early expensive books he has still not produced a Group 1 winner. That is surely coming, but it didn't happen soon enough to stop his fee dropping from £60,000 to £10,000 (having been at £8,000 last year when he covered 162 mares). Sure, plenty of breeders have had their fingers burnt, but he is now at a price which is workable. He had nine stakes winners in 2023, including three Group 2 winners, putting him ahead of some fairly big names, and he certainly should not yet be considered solely a jumps sire.

On the rise

Territories (Ire) is quietly compiling a decent record and is one who could easily be overlooked in the rush for the new stallions. He shouldn't be. Haydock Sprint Cup winner Regional (GB) became his second Group 1 winner last year after the Prix de l'Opera heroine Rougir (Fr), and he was represented by another seven stakes winners in Australia, Britain, Italy and Germany last year. His fee has been pretty consistent: £12,000 for his first four years and £10,000 for the next four. Territories is not necessarily flashy but, from the family of Shamardal and Street Cry (Ire), he has a solid feel to him.

There's a lot of love for Kodi Bear (Ire), particularly in our house, because he is from the family of Roy Rocket (Fr). But that pointless fact aside, he made a decent start with his first crop which included the Group 2 winner Go Bears Go (Ire) and Oaks runner up Mystery Angel (Ire). He needs to build on that, but he has some bigger and more expensive crops on the way through following his early success. This season's two-year-olds were conceived from his lowest fee of €6,000. He's been at €15,000 for the last two seasons and remains at that figure in 2024. Crucially, the market seems to retain faith in his stock.

Phoenix Of Spain (Ire) caught a few people by surprise with the early results of his first two-year-olds, his 18 winners including the G2 Vintage S. winner Haatem (Ire) and giving him a 36% winners to runners strike-rate. His fee for 2024 has been reduced by a third from his opening price of €15,000, and €10,000 seems a reasonable level for this good-moving Classic winner.

Heading into the second season

In France, Sealiway (Fr) was the busiest new stallion of 2023 and, a good juvenile himself, it would be no surprise to see him make a reasonably fast start with his runners. That won't be until 2026, but considering the leap his own increasingly popular sire Galiway (GB) has made, from €3,000 to €30,000, Sealiway's fee of €12,000 may look reasonable in years to come, and he has certainly been lent some support to get his career off to a decent start.

For his personalised breeder bonus scheme alone, which returns for his second year at stud, it is worth taking a chance on Stradivarius (Ire), who covered 120 mares in his first year and remains at £10,000. He's unlikely to get you the Brocklesby winner but if he sires horses in a similar mould to himself, there could be plenty of fun and rewards to be had down the line.

TDN Value Podium

Bronze: Gleneagles (Ire), Coolmore, €17,500

From a top-drawer family, Gleneagles had weighty expectations on his shoulders from the start. While he may not have quite lived up to that level, and his fee has come down accordingly, he has steadily proved himself to be more than useful and was represented by nine group winners last year, while his daughter One Look (Ire) was the easy winner of the Goffs Million on debut, having been picked up for €65,000 as a yearling. In the last two years another three of his daughters have sold for in excess of 500,000gns at the December Mares Sale.

Silver: Ardad (Ire), Overbury Stud, £12,500

Ardad could have a big year in store. From being the leading first-season sire in Britain in 2021, when his son Perfect Power (Ire) won the G2 Norfolk S., G1 Prix Morny and G1 Middle Park S., his numbers dropped off keenly to just 18 foals in his third crop, but the success of his first runners meant that his book soared to three figures, and he has 101 two-year-olds in 2024, with 144 yearlings to follow those. From a lowest fee of £4,000 in 2021, he has since then stood at £12,500, which keeps him in a commercial bracket, with a yearling average last year of almost seven times his fee.

Gold: Study Of Man (Ire), Lanwades, £12,500

One of the best-bred stallions in Europe, this son of Deep Impact (Jpn) made a really promising start with his first two-year-olds last year and is another who could be set for a big season. His most obvious Classic prospect from his nine winners at a strike-rate of 35% is Deepone (Ire), winner of the G2 Beresford S., a race whose previous winners include Sea The Stars (Ire), Saxon Warrior (Jpn), and Luxembourg (Ire). But there are others who could well step up on impressive performances last season, including the French-trained Birthe (Ire) and Newmarket winner Sons And Lovers (GB). One would expect his stock to be progressive and there's a number of well-bred youngsters yet to make an appearance, not least a half-brother to the Derby winner Desert Crown (GB).

Breeder's perspective: Tom Whelan, Church View Stables

Gold: Kodi Bear (Ire)

Silver: Supremacy (Ire)

Bronze: Space Blues (Ire)

Breeder and pinhooker Tom Whelan says, “I've had great luck with Kodi Bear so I'd have to put him forward as being the best-value stallion in this bracket. He gets great-looking horses and they all have a great attitude and lovely size for a son of Kodiac (GB). He's just very hard to knock. I'm a huge fan.  

“I have been very taken by some of the progeny of Supremacy. He looks to have a real chance. Another one who had his first foals last year was Space Blues and, while I might be a bit biased here because I got decent money for one, I'd be happy to use him going forward. I better give a mention to two others, Phoenix Of Spain and Lucky Vega (Ire), as they are producing the goods at this level as well.”

The post Value Sires Part III: 10,000 to 20,000 appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

It feels presumptuous enough to offer counsel even on cheaper sires, when each mating should boil down to you finding an optimal fit for an individual mare that you know inside out. Still greater hesitation, then, must precede any attempt to discover “value” among this lot.

No stallion has any business standing at this kind of money unless demonstrably of elite caliber. So while we'll be nervously proposing a Podium, as usual, we won't be dwelling unduly on the rest. You can take it as read that most of these horses must be punching their weight, both on the track and at the sales.

Instead, I'd just like to make one or two more general observations, in concluding this series, on the current trading environment.

Here's a series of what feel like pretty uncontentious statements.

1) Fees, overall, feel rather too high now that a long bull   run has tapered off and the middle market is being stretched by polarization.

2) At the same time, books assembled by unproven sires are reaching a size that must contain seeds of peril for the future of the breed. We know that most won't make the grade, meaning that the gene pool is increasingly being flooded with… well, choose your own pejorative.

3) But stallion farms have little room for maneuver, on either front. Knowing how the commercial market will behave nowadays, their accountants have only two options to retrieve the massive investment required to recruit an attractive stallion. The first is to start fees as high as they can, on the basis that it's now closer to “one and out” than “three and out”. The other is to keep fees more accessible, and instead go all out for volume. That necessarily exposes breeders to bringing an unexceptional specimen to saturated catalogues, but they all book their mares with their eyes open and many are evidently prepared to gamble on a home run. Pricing a horse fairly without resorting to appalling volume is an extremely difficult balancing act, and in this series I have tried to identify farms that look after their clients best in those terms.

Gun Runner | Sarah Andrew

4) Commercial breeders operate in a very difficult environment and need to put bread on the table. If you've had a weanling break a leg playing in a paddock, or lost a mare foaling, then you're going not going to be factoring too many noble thoughts about the long-term health of the breed into your choice of stallion. Same applies to all the pinhookers. The real blame, therefore, rests with those directing ringside spending.

5) These, in turn, have only one cogent explanation for their behavior. And no, it's not because rolling the dice on new stallions is their only window for hitting an elite stallion because all the proven ones are too expensive. Okay, horses like Gun Runner and Curlin have turned out to be at their most accessible when starting out, even though priced at or near the top of their intake. But the reality is that the vast majority of rookies will never match the ratios consistently achieved by some of the highly affordable, prove-a-mare stalwarts noted in this series. So the remaining logic is a self-fulfilling one: buyers like new sires because these will typically turn out to have received their biggest and best books, precisely because that's where all the attention is expected to be.

6) But hang on a minute. What happens when these books become so big that the mare quality becomes swamped by quantity? If you truly believe that you have spotted a stallion with unusual potential, why not stick with him as his second, third and fourth books dwindle? He may no longer be getting top mares, but good luck picking out the gold from the glister when the rookies are routinely corralling way over 200. You'd still be getting that priceless “sire power,” but at a diminishing cost. Where were all these guys when Into Mischief, Tapit and War Front had no friends in their third and fourth years? That's a real service for your clients, hanging in there for the value when everyone else runs away screaming. Low tide is exactly when you should be getting aboard. As a young stallion gets closer to putting horses into the gate, surely you're just getting closer to being proved right?

7) That leaves us with little alternative but to assume that professional counsellors spend their clients' money on new sires first and foremost because they don't really have to put their neck on the line. They're participating in a communal game of fantasy breeding, and when they do hit a dud–and we all know what a dud looks like, even if hundreds of foals means that he can still be promoted for “yet another stakes winner”–they can shrug their shoulders and say, “Don't blame me, everybody loved that horse!” And conversely they can gloat when they happen to land on a seam of gold. Well, even I can do that occasionally, and in the earlier stages of this series I've been perfectly happy to suggest a roll of the dice on one or two young horses that seem to be underpriced for their potential. But for every Not This Time I might find, over the years there's no doubt that I'm going to like as many duds as the next guy.

Life Is Good | Sarah Andrew

So, in conclusion: the bottom line is that stallion fees are only too high if you lack the courage of your convictions. Certainly, there can't have been many better epochs for the breed-to-race programs. But as I never tire of saying, there should be nothing more commercial than putting a winner under your mare.

Whether you want to bring down fees, or book sizes, the solution is the same. You just need to broaden the type of stallions that you support.

That way, everyone's a winner. Using horses that have at least demonstrated some competence to replicate the prowess that earned them a place at stud would a) allow relief on fees, b) even out book sizes, c) improve your chances of producing a racehorse, and d) duly improve the resilience of the racing population, with all the incidental benefits to a sport under growing social pressure.

The only comfort about our present situation is a cold one, in that things are even worse in Europe. The saving grace of the American industry is that it's still a commercial aspiration– whatever 293 mares to Golden Pal might tell you–to have a horse hold out through two turns of dirt on the first Saturday in May. And that, of course, is a competence that unites the majority of the elite sires with whom we close our series today.

This price range admits only one absolute beginner, Cody's Wish, whose intake received a separate assessment at the start of the series. And overall, logically enough, there are far fewer untested sires standing at this kind of fee than lower down the pyramid: only FLIGHTLINE ($150,000), LIFE IS GOOD ($85,000) and ESSENTIAL QUALITY ($65,000) are maintaining a place at this level pending examination on the racetrack. Nobody needs reminding of the excellence of their first careers, and the first two only have their first weanlings due. But it's perhaps instructive of the type of program keenest to tap into Essential Quality's wholesome combination of class and constitution (champion at two and three) with family (now further decorated by Forte, who shares a third dam) that only five weanlings were traded out from his debut crop (eight offered; median $280,000).

At the other end of the scale, we have a few sires whose right to stand at dizzy fees is too familiar to required reiteration. We have just celebrated a fifth consecutive title for INTO MISCHIEF ($250,000), who has duly opened new horizons with the mid-career upgrade in his mares. Competing with the Into Mischief production line may well leave CURLIN ($250,000) as one of the best sires never to have his status formally gilded by a championship. And TAPIT ($185,000) is still the main man, when it comes to lifetime ratios. He had a quietish year by his metronomic standards, and his books will be being prudently managed these days, but I still hope to see him come up with that Derby winner to round off a resume that features stakes winners at one-in-10 named foals, 101 of them at graded level at 6.2 percent.

Justify | Sarah Andrew

Nor is there any need to dwell on the young guns JUSTIFY (private), whose success either side of the water–six elite scorers in 2023, notably an outstanding champion juvenile in Europe–suggests that he may be eligible for a historic role in our urgent quest for sires to reconcile the disastrous segregation of European and American gene pools; and GUN RUNNER ($250,000), whose early percentages remain simply freakish. In 2023 his black-type, graded-stakes and Grade I performers respectively came in at 17.2, 11.8 and 5.4 percent of starters!

A lot of the best sires are now in the evening of their careers, and these two appear to have a huge opportunity to dominate in the years ahead, along with NOT THIS TIME ($150,000) who will now only just be consolidating his breakout.

It would perhaps be taking loyalty too far to give Not This Time his umpteenth Value Podium at 10 times the fee that first excited us, but rest assured there's an awful lot still to come from a stallion who complements the priceless transatlantic legacy of Giant's Causeway with indigenous Tartan Farms dirt speed. Remember that his juveniles this year will be his first sired even at $40,000, up from just $12,500. They reached a median of $210,000 (average $287,025) as yearlings, nice work at the conception fee (and up from $150,000/$209,688). Even after adding Up to the Mark as a fifth Grade I winner in three crops, Not This Time may do well to keep up his incredible start as the crop conceived at his lowest ebb turns three. But the upgrade in quality will soon kick in, and then all bets will be off.

In contrast UNCLE MO ($150,000) first stood at this fee back in 2017 and QUALITY ROAD ($200,000) reached the same mark by 2019. By this stage, then, they have pretty well established who and what they are, and duly finished fourth and fifth respectively in the general list. Quality Road has become a particularly consistent sales performer, advancing his median in 2023 to $375,000 from $350,000, behind only Into Mischief and Curlin. It was Uncle Mo (median $212,500) who fired his racetrack arrows closer to the bull's-eye in 2023, 14 stakes winners (at 4.4 percent of starters) including three at Grade I level, whereas Quality Road's 18 (7.2 percent) featured just National Treasure at that altitude.

Good Magic | Sarah Andrew

If that pair are plainly in their prime, GOOD MAGIC ($125,000) has broken into the six-figure club after producing the Derby winner at the first attempt. That's quite a hike from $50,000 but he's no one-trick pony, counting Eclipse finalist Muth among half a dozen black-type winners already from 45 juvenile starters in 2023. Obviously, he's going to have to keep advancing his ringside performance to warrant this fee, having achieved a median of $155,000 (average $217,390) with his latest crop. But that was up from $100,000 ($130,250) in 2022, and must itself be acknowledged a fine yield from a $30,000 conception fee.

From the same glitzy intake, BOLT D'ORO rises to $60,000 from $35,000 after a second productive campaign. Though his yearling dividends slipped, at a median $82,500/average $113,218, they similarly represented a punchy yield on a $15,000 conception fee. Bolt d'Oro has started a higher proportion of his foals than Justify and Good Magic, so we'll have to see whether that's a function of superior precocity or overall soundness. As noted earlier in the series, however, what really excites about this class is its depth: horses like Army Mule and Girvin are essentially matching their more expensive peers from much lower fees and volume. Those horses deserve a chance to show what do with their own upgrades before anyone reaches any definitive conclusions about the pecking order.

At the other end of the spectrum are some much older sires with a sustained record of achievement behind them. WAR FRONT has had his books managed with restraint for so long that he will never have adequate volume to shake up the general list, unless he has a real star, but even without one last year he maintained his customary strike-rates, for instance with 10 graded stakes winners from just 166 starters. His career ratios are beyond even Tapit, which makes $100,000 a terrific play for those who a) can afford it and b) aren't prey to a childish aversion to turf.

The MUNNINGS trajectory got so giddy last year that he was hoisted to six figures but that proved to be a moment of overexcitement and, after his book shrank to 146 from 204, he has dropped to $75,000 for 2024. His reputation has raced ahead of his fee for most of his career and he's actually on the point of upgrading his stock on the track, his incoming juveniles being the first conceived even at $40,000 and duly nudging his yearling median forward ($160,000 from $150,000). He has that big 2022 book of $85,000 covers in the pipeline, and the access he has enjoyed to better mares should also help him improve a somewhat pedestrian ratio for his five elite scorers to date. Munnings is nowadays virtually a lock for the top 10 in the general list and that makes him look pretty fairly priced.

Practical Joke | Coolmore

His studmate PRACTICAL JOKE is becoming one of the busiest avenues to his sire, albeit his affordability is diminishing (fee up to $65,000 from $25,000). Commercial breeders can't get enough of him, his latest yearlings achieving a terrific yield (median $110,000/average $153,807) on the cover fee. The obvious caveat is that his volume is now such (482 mares over the last two years!) that you had better not find yourself with an ordinary specimen…

CANDY RIDE (Arg) was one of those middle-rank sires most exposed to polarization at the sales (median down to $100,000, which was half his average, from $140,000 the previous year) but remains settled at $75,000 after Candied and Geaux Rocket Ride kept his name in lights. His son TWIRLING CANDY (average $160,064 also well ahead of his $90,000 median; clearly their good ones are very good) similarly stands at $60,000 for a third year after producing his eighth Grade I winner, albeit his respectable lifetime ratios don't quite match those of STREET SENSE at the same fee.

Street Sense arguably offers fine value at this level, even if his bargain buddy Hard Spun would make as much sense at a lower fee: some of their indices are uncannily in step. But at the sales Street Sense is maintaining a $150,000 average, well over double that of Hard Spun. That confirms the latter to be an end user's delight, but Street Sense covers all bases.

Their venerable neighbor MEDAGLIA D'ORO reached a peak of $250,000 in 2018 but was slashed from $150,000 to $100,000 in 2022 and now suffers a fresh indignity at $75,000. The fact is that his Hong Kong 'ATM' Golden Sixty belongs to the same crop as his last big star here, Bolt d'Oro, leaving the tide of fashion to ebb somewhat: his latest yearlings had to settle for a $180,000 median/$248,371 average (down from $242,500/$339,918). Nonetheless this is the same flesh and blood whose 22 Grade I winners in the Northern Hemisphere (26 overall) long gave him top billing at Saratoga and Book I. Thoroughbreds will always confound assumptions and it would be gratifying to see such a glamorous specimen muster one or two last hurrahs in the evening of his career.

VALUE PODIUM

Bronze Medal: GHOSTZAPPER
Awesome Again–Baby Zip (Relaunch)
$75,000, Hill 'n' Dale

I guess it all depends what you're trying to achieve. But if you're one of those strange people simply trying to breed as good a racehorse as you can, then you certainly won't mind that this magnificent animal has now entered his 24th year.

Ghostzapper | Sarah Andrew

He was not very temperately handled early in his stud career, launched at $200,000 and slashed from $125,000 to $30,000 after his first juveniles blew out. Though a colt from his debut crop won the GI Blue Grass S., he was promptly cut again to $20,000. It was a long road back, but he's now just two short of bringing up 100 stakes winners at 7.8 percent of named foals.

Across the board, in fact, he's basically the same sire as Uncle Mo, who gets his black-type winners at 7.1 percent. Their stakes performers come at 13.1 and 13 percent respectively; Ghostzapper's graded stakes winners at 4.2 percent, against 3.5 percent for Uncle Mo; graded stakes performers weigh in at 7.2 and 7.7 percent; and 14 Grade I winners apiece come at 1.1 and 1.0 percent. But Uncle Mo stands at twice the fee, and has accumulated more named foals from six fewer crops!

Obviously Ghostzapper pays a commercial price for being less likely to produce precocious horses, but the likes of Mystic Guide and Goodnight Olive continue to reward those prepared to await the kind of maturity that enabled their sire to stretch his murderous speed, aged four, to one of the great modern performances. And anyone who saw the GIII Saratoga Special last summer will form their own views about Ghostzapper never getting precocious stock!

In the meantime, he has emerged, consistently with the sire-line, as an important broodmare sire, his daughters having now given us Up To The Mark as well as Justify himself. I don't know whether Ghostzapper was confined to 75 mares last year in deference to his age, or just because of commercial wariness. As your ideal Book II sire, he was vulnerable to market polarization this year. In the circumstances he did well to maintain a $170,590 average ($187,916 in 2022), albeit his median duly suffered ($115,000 down from $165,500).

But that's a sideshow at this time of his life. You know what he can do for your program, especially if you wouldn't mind retaining a filly. And you also know that there's a finite opportunity to tap so proximately into a combination as resonant as grandsire Deputy Minister and damsire Relaunch. It's a privilege worth paying for and, relative to plenty of untested young sires, it's one that doesn't cost so much.

Silver Medal: NYQUIST
Uncle Mo–Seeking Gabrielle (Forestry)
$85,000, Darley

Here's a horse back on the move, with his incoming juveniles sired at $75,000–up from $40,000, a response to the freshman title he won in 2020. He then had to be throttled back to $55,000 after hitting a flat spot the following year, mustering a solitary graded stakes winner, but that is now turning out to have been a blip.

Nyquist | Sarah Andrew

This year he came up with his third and fourth Grade I winners, and was denied a fifth in poignant circumstances, as sire of New York Thunder. Into their slipstream followed a bunch of juveniles that showed both the precocity to win at Royal Ascot (Crimson Advocate) and the flair to put themselves on the dirt Classic radar (Nysos, Knighstbridge). Nysos looks a pretty freakish talent and we know that his sire stretched his own juvenile speed when and where it counted, on the first Saturday in May.

Nyquist's $140,000 yearling median in 2023 needs to keep progressing, to justify his new fee, but hopefully that process is well underway (median was $110,000 in 2022, and average meanwhile markedly up at $192,749 from $148,275). He remained fully subscribed during his couple of years regrouping at $55,000, so there's unlikely to be any kind of bump in the road now.

The one he endured in his second year has certainly levelled off, so that even though he emerged in the same intake as Not This Time, he's faring pretty respectably even against that monster talent. Nyquist can't match his ratios for winners in each category, but in black-type, graded stakes and Grade I performers there's not much between them: 12.7, 6.7 and 1.8 percent of named foals for Not This Time and 12.1, 6.5 and 2.3 percent for Nyquist. True, Not This Time must have had lesser materials with which to make his name, but he's now at a fee altitude that requires oxygen masks, whereas Nyquist is still hauling his way up the rope behind him.

Gold Medal: CONSTITUTION
Tapit–Baffled (Distorted Humor)
$110,000, WinStar

This horse is at an interesting crossroads. His incoming juveniles were conceived at $85,000, the sophomores at $40,000, and his 4-year-olds at just $15,000. From 48 starters last year, even this latter group came close to a Grade I score through Webslinger, beaten a head in the Saratoga Derby and a neck in the Hollywood Derby.

Constitution | Sarah Andrew

The 2024 sophomores emerge from a bumper crop of 187 live foals, the first Constitution produced after his freshman breakout in 2019 (second to American Pharoah). They made a very promising start on the track, placing him second in the table for 2-year-old earnings. In fairness, he had a pretty enormous footprint, with 88 juvenile starters, but Catching Freedom set the tone for his peers in 2024 with his Smarty Jones S. success on New Year's Day. In fact, he's one of three Constitutions in the top nine of colleague T.D. Thornton's opening Derby Top 12.

And now, as noted, we can look forward to the $85,000 crop corralled by Tiz the Law's sophomore emergence. They averaged $281,125 as yearlings, up from $244,242, with the median steady at $200,000. The good old pipeline is loaded, then, and we know that those that stand out from a crowd will bring the big money.

His aging sire has arranged quite a race for the eventual succession, but for now this appears to be the heir to catch for the likes of Flightline and Essential Quality. Constitution has seen a lot of life for a horse of his age, including having shuttled to Chile for three years, but there's definitely a scenario where a fee held at $110,000 turns out to be a staging post on the way to still higher ones.

Breeder Selections

Paul Manganaro, Belladonna Racing

Paul Manganaro | Christina Bossinakis

Bronze Medal: Twirling Candy ($60,000)
Twirling Candy offers breeders a lot of bang for their buck. He has ranked in the top 15 on the national sires by progeny earnings list the last two seasons and has produced eight Grade I winners to-date.

Silver Medal: Quality Road ($200,000)
Quality Road has consistently produced the “Big Saturday Afternoon” horse. He can get you a quality two-year-old and one that can compete at the highest level around two turns. His 2.14 (AEI) average earning index is on or near par with the elite stallions currently standing in America. His offspring are also very popular in the sales ring.

Gold Medal: Constitution ($110,000)
To have access to Constitution at his stud fee is like stealing in my opinion. He's a stallion that had 17 yearlings sell for $400,000 or higher in 2023 topped by a $1.3-million Keeneland September yearling. The offspring from his best book of mares are just starting to hit the ground in the past few years and as Jan. 11 he has three colts ranked in the TDN's Top 12 2024 Derby list.

The post Value Sires For 2024 Part 7: The Big Guns appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

One can't blame breeders either for showing such interest in the new stallions at stud, for they have yet to be judged (though they will be, just as soon as their first foals hit the sales grounds) and have therefore “done nothing wrong”.

Let's not forget that in almost all cases, for a stallion to be at stud in the first place he was a decent racehorse. But there are degrees of decency, from the downright jaw-dropping bred-in-the-purple Classic winner to the Group 3 winner whose precocity and speed are really all he has going for him unless he can throw a nice type in the first place, and then those nice types can go on to do as their father did. That can be enough these days, and there's a separate and lengthy debate to be had about whether that really should be enough. But for breeders trying to sustain their business through a commercial approach, the first thing that matters is how likely you are to be able to sell a foal or yearling well, no matter how much we all know that breeding for the racecourse is what really counts in the long run, as long as that run isn't too long a run, if you know what I mean.

Aye, there's the rub. The long-term view can be rewarded with the greatest riches. Breeding a 'Cup horse', for example. Big prizes on big days, or perhaps a big offer from another nation that has already lost its way on the stamina front, or indeed from a major jumps owner if things haven't quite worked out on the Flat. Increasingly, through, few breeders can or want to wait that long. And as one breeder remarked at the recent foal sales, “At least if you have a horse by a first-season sire you know that every pinhooker is going to look at him.” 

So as we begin our Value Sires series in Europe for the season ahead, we will tackle the newcomers first before we head on, in price brackets, to those stallions who may or may not be suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, which in the bloodstock business often merely means they are no longer this year's 'it boy'.

How anyone can base a business plan on such an unpredictable collective whim is beyond me, but that's the challenge faced by breeders when deciding on matings each year. If you are using a currently popular stallion who will cover a large book then you'd better pray extra hard for a corker of an individual if there are any holes in your mare's pedigree or production record. 

From Paddington (GB) at €55,000 to a handful of sires at €5,000, with just about everything in between, there is a huge range in both price and talent of this year's intake. We are not including a full list of new sires here, and the three which we consider to represent the best value in this division feature on the podium at the conclusion of this piece.

Value is relative, of course, and the fee for Paddington is punchy enough but then he was superb last year in his somewhat unusual progression from the Madrid Handicap in a bog at Naas through to that string of four Group 1 victories on summer ground at the Curragh, Ascot and Sandown and then back to more give at Goodwood. You can't really argue with a record that includes the Irish 2,000 Guineas, St James' Palace S. (beating Chaldean), Eclipse S. and Sussex S. Mostahdaf (Ire) and Nashwa (GB) had his measure at York in the International but by then Paddington had won six on the bounce, at a rate of a race pretty much every month since late March.

His first three dams all earned black type on the track, and we like to see a bit of Montjeu (Ire) on the page, through his Listed-winning dam Modern Eagle (Ger), providing a variation on a theme of Coolmore's other two sons of Siyouni (Fr), Sottsass (Fr) and St Mark's Basilica (Fr), who are both out of Galileo (Ire) mares. Paddington's granddam Millionaia (Ire) (Peintre Celebre) was runner-up in the G1 Prix de Diane and great granddam  Moonlight Dance (Alysheba) was third in the G1 Saint-Alary. But his fourth dam Madelia (Fr) (Caro {Ire}) outpointed them both by winning the Diane, Saint-Alary and the G1 Poule d'Essai des Pouliches, so there is plenty on the page to reinforce his claim to future greatness. 

It is up to each breeder to decide whether or not €55,000 is a price they can swallow, but it is a pretty safe bet that Paddington, himself a €420,000 yearling, will already have plenty of takers.

Coolmore is big on bears this year, and in fact Paddington and his fellow new recruit Little Big Bear (Ire) both hail from Wildenstein families, with the latter being a great grandson of the Hall-of-Famer All Along (Fr) (Targowice). Reinforcing  the No Nay Never blood in Tipperary, he did as he was expected and was fast and early. At three, he added the G2 Sandy Lane to the previous year's win in the G1 Phoenix S. in which he was injured. He was then beaten by Shaquille (GB) in the G1 Commonwealth Cup and a further injury incurred in the July Cup brought about his early retirement. Little Big Bear starts out at €27,500.

Putting on the Rizz

The Oxford English Dictionary's word of the year for 2023 was 'Rizz'. No, me neither, but apparently if you're a regular TikTokker, you will already know that this means “style, charm, or attractiveness, and the ability to attract a romantic or sexual partner”, or put more simply is a shortened version of charisma. 

I don't know the French translation of rizz, but let's go with 'ooh la la', and it's something which Ace Impact (Ire) has in spades. Who among us did not marvel at the way he chewed up and spat out the otherwise brilliant Big Rock (Ire) down the Chantilly straight in the Prix du Jockey Club? Could he stay a mile and a half? Could he ever, just as soon as the afterburners were engaged to propel him past Westover (GB) and Onesto (Ire) in the Arc.

Jean-Claude Rouget told TDN in October that he watched Ace Impact's six races through again after he was retired, perhaps to remind himself that, though brief, his career really did burn brightly. Always leave them wanting more, they say, and he certainly did after six perfect races. It's a shame but understandable, as when it comes to launching a Prix du Jockey Club and Arc winner at an almost brand new stallion operation, the time to strike is when he is unbeaten and his last sensational run is still emblazoned on breeders' memories. 

In contrast, we saw plenty of Modern Games (Ire), who holds that rare bragging right of being a Group 1 winner at two, three and four, and a dual Breeders' Cup winner to boot.  He's a proper miler, a Classic-winning one, and it'll cost £30,000 to send him a mare, but good luck if you've been dawdling as it was reported at Darley's open morning on Tuesday that he was full before Christmas. 

It's not hard to see why as Modern Games is a lovely individual with balance and scope, who joins his sire Dubawi (Ire) on the Dalham Hall Stud roster. His family is one which is increasingly repaying Sheikh Mohammed, who bought his granddam Epitome (Ire) (Nashwan) from her breeder Gerald Leigh. She has given the Godolphin operation the G1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere winner Ultra (Ire) (Manduro {Ger}) among her 10 winning offspring. Modern Ideals (GB) (New Approach (Ire) did not make that list of winners, running only twice unsuccessfully in France, but she has more than atoned in her second job as the dam of not just Modern Games but also his fellow Classic winner Mawj (Ire) (Exceed And Excel {Aus}) and Listed winner Modern News (GB) (Shamardal).

Son has also followed father in the case of Chaldean (GB), who is now at Banstead Manor Stud alongside Frankel (GB) and, like his sire, won the 2,000 Guineas and G1 Dewhurst S. If there were two buzz names during the December Sales among those touring the stallion studs of Newmarket then they were Chaldean and Shaquille (GB), whom we will come on to a bit later. Chaldean is at £25,000, which is significantly more that two other sons of Frankel retiring to Newmarket studs with higher ratings this year but, as Patrick Cooper pointed out in yesterday's TDN, he has plenty going for him on the commercial front. Chaldean was a relatively early two-year-old, carrying decent form through wins at Newbury then the G3 Acomb S., G2 Champagne S. and finally that year's Dewhurst before claiming his Classic laurels on his return to Newmarket. 

We wait to see what his Group 2-winning half-brother Alkumait (GB) (Showcasing {GB}) can achieve with his first runners this year, but certainly Chaldean's family has been much in the news for his breeder Whitsbury Manor Stud. Five of his dam's offspring have now earned black type, including the Group 1-placed Get Ahead (GB) (Showcasing {GB}), who sold for 2.5 million gns at Tattersalls in December. It's a family going places, and Juddmonte will doubtless lend the might of its broodmare band to help Chaldean get off to the best possible start at stud.

France Blessed with Enticing Names

Had Vadeni (Fr), who was featured last week, been retired after his impressive three-year-old season, it is easy to imagine that he would be standing for more than €18,000 but that is his opening mark now at Haras de Bonneval which could well represent value about a horse who romped to victory in the “stallion-making” Prix du Jockey Club before also landing the Eclipse against his elders. 

His fellow Aga Khan Studs newcomer Erevann (Fr) can't match Vadeni on performance but he can on pedigree and this son of two Classic winners, with a good helping of 'rizz', really does look excellent value at €8,000. 

France is not short of new and enticing stallion prospects this year and three worthy of mention here are Mishriff (Ire) at €17,500, Onesto at €12,500 and Bay Bridge (GB) at €6,000.

In some respects Mishriff is both fortunate and unfortunate. A badly-placed kick to the wall of his stable last winter meant that he missed all of what should have been his debut covering season. His price has been trimmed from what was his planned opening fee of €20,000, and you get an awful lot of performance and physique for the price he is now. He was a terrific racehorse who moves like a dream. Then of course there's his family, which includes those not insignificant stallions Invincible Spirit (Ire) and Kodiac (GB). Go and have another look at Mishriff at Haras de Montfort & Preaux if you're in France for the Route des Etalons. You won't be disappointed, especially as that extra year of letting down before embarking on his stud duties means that he now looks like a man among boys when compared to fellow new recruits.

Onesto is a new Frankel for France at Haras d'Etreham. A compact horse whose breeze-up fractions at Ocala belied his middle-distance pedigree, he sent agent Hubert Guy into a similar rush to buy him for $535,000 and bring him back to Europe where he duly won the G1 Grand Prix de Paris.

After winning the G1 Champion S. of 2022, Bay Bridge had a frustrating time of it last year. He did win the G3 September S. to bring his tally to seven victories from 16 starts, giving a solidity to his record, which included a close second to Luxembourg (Ire) in the G1 Tattersalls Gold Cup. A later-maturing and powerful individual, the son of New Bay (GB) joins Haras du Mesnil, a stud with an excellent track record. He really should be given some consideration at his bargain fee. 

Your Guess is as Good as Ours

If Mehmas (Ire) is the next Kodiac for Tally-Ho Stud, then who will be the next Mehmas? Could it be a son of Kodiac in the farm's latest stallion, Good Guess (GB)? His trainer Fabrice Chappet thought plenty of him from his earliest days in training, and it wasn't just because he was an expensive yearling at 420,000gns. He won his first two races as a juvenile but it wasn't until his three-year-old season that we really saw him flourish when Good Guess won the G1 Prix Jean Prat and G3 Prix Djebel, both over seven furlongs. Bred by Cheveley Park Stud, he's a grandson of their 1,000 Guineas winner Russian Rhythm (Kingmambo) and he's a well-made individual. At €17,500, he will have the Tally-Ho faithful, not to mention a decent number of the home mares, in his corner. 

Triple Time (Ire) very nearly made the podium below, but I'm only allowed three spots and it was a competitive field in this division. At £10,000, he has been fairly priced for his opening season at Dalham Hall Stud. Like Chaldean, he is a Group 1-winning miler by Frankel from a family that is clearly going places. Triple Time, winner of the Queen Anne S. last season, was actually rated 2lbs higher than Chaldean but his significantly lower fee reflects the fact that his top-level win didn't come until he was a four-year-old, though he was a Listed winner at two. He was lightly raced, making only two appearances in each of his last two seasons, but he was clearly no slouch and is one of two Group 1 winners from his dam Reem Three (GB) (Mark Of Esteem {Ire}), who has so far produced seven black-type runners. The family could be boosted further still this year by Classic prospect Rosallion (GB)  (Blue Point {Ire}).

Like Tally-Ho Stud in Ireland, England's Whitsbury Manor Stud has a loyal following of commercial clientele along with its own sizeable band of mostly speedily-bred broodmares. With Showcasing and Havana Grey (GB) the stud has had two of the most talked-about stallions in Britain in recent years, which is why one can't overlook the farm's latest recruit Dragon Symbol (GB), who was also bred at Whitsbury Manor. By Cable Bay, he appeared to be a Group 1 winner for a few agonising moments when finishing first past the post in the Commonwealth Cup. The race was awarded to Campanelle (Ire) in the stewards' room and he was demoted to second. Dragon Symbol has won five sprints in total as well as finishing second in the G1 July Cup and third in the G1 Nunthorpe. Could this bridesmaid become the bride, or even better the groom, in his next career, which he starts at a fee of £8,000?

There has been a lot going on at the National Stud stallion yard in recent years with the arrival of Lope Y Fernandez (Ire) in 2022 being followed the next year by Stradivarius (Ire). Now comes the Shadwell-bred Mutasaabeq (GB), a son of Invincible Spirit from a solid stallion family which includes Nashwan, Unfuwain and Deep Impact (Jpn), with Baaeed (GB) in the wings. Mutasaabeq, a treble Group 2 winner whose pedigree was discussed in more detail in these pages recently, is introduced at a very reasonable £6,500. 

The shuffling of the pack which has brought Soldier's Call (GB) to Dullingham Park for his first season in England has meant that there was room for another son of Showcasing at Ballyhane Stud in Ireland. Step forward Asymmetric (Ire), the G2 Richmond S. winner and Morny third of 2021, who returned from a stint in America to win a Listed contest at Deauville last year on the same card that his half-brother Mill Stream (Ire) (Gleneagles {Ire}) claimed his first stakes victory. Speed is what it says on his tin, and there will doubtless be plenty of breeders signing up for that at €7,000.

TDN Value Podium

Bronze: Mostahdaf (Ire), Beech House Stud, £15,000

As a good-looking winner of both the G1 Prince of Wales's S. and G1 Juddmonte International and a well-bred son of Frankel, it's hard not to think that Mostahdaf is a snip at £15,000. His dam Handassa (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}) is a Listed winner who has already bred another dual Group 1-winning miler in Nazeef (GB) (Invincible Spirit {Ire}) while granddam Starstone (GB) (Diktat {GB}) is a half-sister to Goodricke (GB) and Pastoral Pursuits (GB), who were both Group 1-winning sprinters by Bahamian Bounty (GB). It's a classy pedigree which really should be pretty commercial. 

Perhaps the fact that Mostahdaf didn't race at two has moderated his fee, and he was undoubtedly at his best at five, but if durability and soundness count against horses these days then we are in the fast lane of the highway to disaster.

Silver: Angel Bleu (Fr), Sumbe, €9,000 

Sumbe has a trio of Group 1-winning newcomers, with the aforementioned Mishriff as well as Belbek (Fr), who should not be overlooked at €7,000. But Angel Bleu at his opening price of €9,000 really smacks of value. On the track he was an extremely likeable individual. Fast, early, but most importantly, hardy. He ran eight times at two for five wins from five furlongs to a mile, including the G2 Vintage S., G1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere and G1 Criterium International. He may have been written off when a setback curtailed his three-year-old season, but the son of Dark Angel (Ire) was back at four to win the G2 Celebration Mile and Listed Spring Trophy.

He's a strong and bonny individual with an international pedigree of broad appeal. His dam, by Galileo, is a sister to Group 1 winners Highland Reel (Ire) and Idaho (Ire), while the achievements of his Australian third dam Circles Of Gold (Aus) (Marscay {Aus}), on the racecourse and at stud, are worthy of their own book.

Gold: Shaquille (GB), Dullingham Park, £15,000

Of course none of this matters until we can see what their runners are capable of, but it was hard not to fall for Shaquille when he sauntered out to the new stallion showing ring at Dullingham Park during the December Sales. He was one of the talking points of that week, with many favourable comments from a range of breeders from all over Europe and he thus receives our first gold medal of this series.

Shaquille doesn't really look like a sprinter, but that's what he was, and a very good one at that, winning the G1 Commonwealth Cup and then downing the colours of his older rivals in the G1 July Cup. He too can call on Galileo as his broodmare sire, and he is by a long way the best son of Charm Spirit (Ire), who was a multiple Group 1-winning miler himself. Grand-dam Danehurst (GB) (Danehill) was more than useful for Cheveley Park Stud and also very fast, as was the G1 Cheveley Park S. winner Hooray (GB) who is from the same family and, being by Invincible Spirit, bred on a similar pattern.

If Shaquille's youngsters look and move like him then he'll be off to a good start in the sales ring, and that, as we know, is a first important marker which can then determine his level of support down the line. 

The post Value Sires for 2024 Part I: New Stallions appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

It tells you a lot about our business that the majority of the two dozen stallions operating at this level can only do so because they have yet to send a single runner into the starting gate. A quarter of these we immediately set to one side, as absolute beginners, because those received separate consideration in the opening instalment of this series. Of the remaining 18, another eight belong to those preceding intakes that remain untested by runners.

Some of these have been taking the precautionary clips often necessary to keep young sires in the game, as commercial breeders maintain as safe a distance as possible from the dangers that accompany racetrack exposure.

You can see that template magnified in one of the two sires who are closest to the moment of truth. AUTHENTIC started out in 2021 as the most expensive in his intake, at $75,000. This year he takes his third consecutive cut, down to $50,000 (from $60,000 and previously $70,000). Yet has he become any less likely to sire racehorses, if you send him a mare this spring, relative to when he retired as Horse of the Year? Far from it, if the market reception is any guide: he duly looked after investors by processing 91 yearlings (120 offered) at a median $235,000 (average $286,076), clear at the top of the class.

Authentic | Sarah Andrew

We all know how the system works. But if you genuinely thought Authentic good value at $75,000, well, you'd better get right back to him now that his fee is down by one-third. After all, a true commercial opportunist should be anticipating a rising tide from all the juvenile winners that will surely be emerging from a debut book of 229 mares, just a couple short of making him the busiest stallion in North America that year!

Of course, Spendthrift operates the model so dexterously that Authentic has meanwhile maintained demand, at his more lenient fees, with books of 202 and 198 mares. With 165 live foals to go to war, he surely gives the farm every chance of a third consecutive champion freshman.

MCKINZIE has bucked the trend by retaining his initial fee of $30,000 for a fourth year. He starred at the sales, sending no fewer than 144 into the ring-a staggering percentage of his 174 live foals. That's expressive of the commercial package he had offered in combining knockout looks with 11 triple-digit Beyers, plus Grade Is at two, three and four. He duly sold 110 at a median $90,000, reaching an average of $149,157 after blowing the doors off with a $1.2 million colt at the September Sale. (Both indices beaten only by Authentic in the class.) We've all seen market discoveries sink without trace, over the years, but McKinzie has certainly raised expectations and duly maintained numbers in the meantime, with books of 171 and 168.

The next intake is also represented by two sires, now preparing their first yearlings for auction. One of their peers, Essential Quality, actually remains beyond even this level and duly topped the weanling averages, but CHARLATAN filled second place in selling 19 of 22 at a median $175,000 and average $206,052. That was what he had to do, having similarly starting out behind only Essential Quality in terms of fee, and he's another whose original investors have been spared a depreciation: he remains $50,000 for 2024.

Charlatan emerged from the same crop and barn as Authentic to emulate the GI Arkansas Derby-GI Malibu S. double of Omaha Beach the previous year, and was only narrowly outstayed when stretching his speed again in the G1 Saudi Cup. Unfortunately he then suffered another setback, but nobody forgot his talent and he started with books of 222 and 223. Breeders evidently recalled that he had himself been a $700,000 yearling out of a genuine Grade I mare.

Maxfield | Sarah Andrew

MAXFIELD takes a mild trim, to $35,000 from $40,000, despite selling 11 of a dozen weanlings at a median $110,000/average $165,181. His farm tends to be more conservative with its books, so 165 mares for his first year looked like a full subscription, with another 134 in his second. Maxfield was beaten by just four horses across 11 starts, won a Grade I as a juvenile by five and a half lengths, and above all is out of a Bernardini half-sister to the admirable stallion Sky Mesa (very fine family overall).

Four youngsters who covered their first mares last spring assembled books that appeared, after the mare cap debacle, to be making a point of some kind-albeit one that may be lost on anyone who ends up with only an average specimen to bring to saturated catalogues.

With 262 partners, EPICENTER was behind only his frenzied studmate Golden Pal among American sires, his championship campaign having featured a standout GI Travers (112 Beyer). His sire has gone beyond reach, for most, and I love the sturdy European influences sowing his deeper family-though I can't imagine that those names were front and central for many others!

His neighbor JACK CHRISTOPHER was nearly as hectic with 247 mares. He must have been an easy sell, even his solitary defeat in the GI Haskell counting in his favor as confirming him to be all speed. He'd have had plenty of support had he retired on the spot after a daylight debut success at Saratoga, and beat a good one when returning for what proved his final start a year later. Both he and Epicenter take the customary trim, from $45,000 to $40,000, to help keep the door revolving.

Jack Christopher | Sara Gordon

Jack Christopher represents Munnings, of course, and it's good to see some of Speightstown's later sons contesting the legacy.

Just like Charlatan, OLYMPIAD was a $700,000 yearling. His debut book of 228, making him the busiest stallion outside Ashford, shows that plenty of other farms are prepared to go all out for numbers, given the chance. He matured through the grades with eight triple-figure Beyers, but the clincher is Chic Shirine as third dam. By this stage of the series, you probably won't be surprised that proven stallions populate the Value Podium, but this guy looks a profoundly wholesome prospect in retaining a fee of $35,0000.

Though JACKIE'S WARRIOR had to settle for “just” 182 mares, he could comfort himself that they included Beholder! He's another to take a clip, to $45,000 from $50,000, but still finds himself standing for more than his own sire. Even so, he will remain in demand as a Grade I winner at Saratoga three years running, an unprecedented achievement gilded by a 28-year-old stakes record in the Hopeful.

Right, now let's get onto some sires that have actually demonstrated some competence to replicate the genetic prowess we should be looking for at this kind of fee.

Of these, the one who has barely started is OMAHA BEACH. He's just completed his freshman season with fourth place in a table dominated by Spendthrift sires, on the face of it hardly measuring up to his status as the most expensive of the quartet. But I'm not alone in retaining high hopes, judged from the fact that his fee has moved back up to $40,000 for 2024, having been allowed to slide from an opening $45,000 to $30,000.

Because while he has only had a couple of stakes winners, he has a class-high 11 black-type performers from 64 starters–a much smaller footprint than his three studmates (Vino Rosso, late bloomer though he was, has fielded 92!)–and these include four at graded stakes level. Omaha Beach presumably received rather more Classic/two-turn mares than his peers, and it's reasonable to expect consolidation from here. It's a rare horse nowadays that can win Grade Is at both six and nine furlongs, and his family overflows with quality.

Obviously, he has volume behind him, standing where he does, but that was partly a function of what seemed pretty lenient pricing throughout. His second crop of yearlings held up very well, at a median $105,000/average $156,508 for 95 sold (116 offered). That keeps Omaha Beach miles clear of his intake, some of whom have been quickly embarrassed by their opening fees. Those who kept the faith in the meantime (185 mares in his fourth book last spring) are entitled remain optimistic, the only caveat being the overall underperformance of this particular class of freshmen, judged by graded stakes winners. It's now over to Omaha Beach to convert his promise into a headliner or two.

City of Light | Lane's End

A similar remark might have been made, this time last year, about CITY OF LIGHT–and, heading into the Breeders' Cup, he had still not justified an against-the-tide hike from $40,000 to $60,000 in 2022. That was the reward for a sensational debut (average $337,698/median $260,000) at the yearling sales. With his book down to 85 last spring, from 132, he was slashed to $35,000 for 2024. But then along came Fierceness, and suddenly everything is looking much more cheerful.

City Of Light may have a few later developers, but 18 black-type performers from no more than 127 to have made the starting gate is a very fair ratio. His fee cut was among several such gestures by his farm after polarisation at the sales (where his third crop were down to a median $75,000/average $126,269 for 63 sold of 75) made it feel as though fees generally remain too high.

In his (very competitive) intake, one who has only elevated his reputation is GIRVIN, who started in Florida at $7,500 and is up to $30,000 (from $20,000) after consolidating the breakout that earned him a ticket to Kentucky. From limited materials, he is so far operating at 6 percent stakes winners (including Grade I scorer Faiza) to named foals, narrowly bettered only by Good Magic and Army Mule in his class.

Girvin's tragic sibling Midnight Bourbon showed what their unraced dam Catch the Moon must be contributing to the equation, and this year Catch the Moon's sister produced Brightwork to lend further Grade I luster to the page. Everyone should duly be fully reconciled by now to Girvin's unfashionable (but superbly-bred) sire. Those who bred to Girvin in his second year in Ocala, at $6,000, certainly can't complain about a yearling average of $92,411 (stretched by a $475,000 colt, but a $41,000 median itself very respectable) for 17 sold from 21 offered. Girvin is firmly on his way, through the roof by the restrained standards of his farm with 181 mares (up from 86) last spring, and only an even more upwardly mobile studmate has kept him off the Value Podium.

Violence | Sarah Andrew

Before we get to that, we have three horses that have by now had ample opportunity to show where they fit in the marketplace: Liam's Map, Maclean's Music and VIOLENCE.

Not that the latter has remotely settled, in terms of pricing! Initially elevated to $60,000 for 2024, he has meanwhile slipped back into this bracket at $40,000. The reasons have been cogently explained, and leave him looking big value as the sire of two new stallions in Kentucky this year, not to mention one with an obvious shot at the freshman title in Volatile. Violence is actually cheaper than his champion son Forte, a rookie whose supporters would surely be delighted if he can produce as many fast horses by the time he reaches the equivalent point of his career. Violence's book will be managed appropriately to his circumstances, but purely in terms of value he looks of imperative interest to eligible mares. For this is a proven achiever at this level–both on the track and in the ring, where he moved his yearling yield up to a median of $80,000 (from $60,000) and average $121,642 (from $97,614). That's impressive for a stallion with seven crops in play. Violence was No. 13 on the general sires' list and the caveats sound very manageable.

His studmate MACLEAN'S MUSIC also looks a fair price at $40,000, after a couple of years at $50,000, considering that he has four sons at stud in the Bluegrass. We've already noted one of them, Jackie's Warrior, getting plenty of trade at a higher fee, while Drain The Clock served no fewer than 199 mares in his debut season. Maclean's Music himself had to settle for 144 last spring, but covered 421 over the previous two seasons after dwindling to 57 in 2020, so the good old “pipeline” is well and truly loaded. In fact, no fewer than 183 live foals in 2022 give him the single biggest battalion of juveniles for the forthcoming campaign. So this looks a pretty shrewd time to stay aboard with a horse who processed as many as 104 of 131 yearlings at an average $118,739 ($70,000 median sound enough, against a $25,000 conception fee).

LIAM'S MAP also maintained his sales performance, selling 80 of 102 offered at a $100,000 median/$124,024 average–conceived at $30,000–albeit down somewhat on the previous crop, who had knocked it out of the park ($130,000/$166,724). Standing at $40,000 for a third year running, he once again proved a reliable source of stakes action this year, chiefly with maturing stock. His next task is to emulate the Hill 'n' Dale pair, who have been in the game rather longer, as a sire of sires.

VALUE PODIUM

Bronze: HARD SPUN
Danzig–Turkish Tryst (Turkoman)
Darley $35,000

So I guess he's not going to change the world, at this stage–but I really don't see much better value to prove your mare, or just to get yourself a racehorse. I know that's not everyone's priority, but the fact is that the last big son of Danzig has now turned 20 and that leaves us diminishing access to the great patriarch.

Hard Spun | Darley

Hard Spun missed a return to the top 10 sires only by cents, relatively speaking, and it was a measure of what he can do for a mare that a horse with as plain a page as Two Phil's could break into the elite of his crop, and now become Hard Spun's fourth son at stud in Kentucky.

It's incredible that a horse with a dozen domestic Grade I winners has never gone higher than $45,000 in the decade since he made the sojourn in Japan that (in hindsight) cost him vital momentum. In that time, he has finished as high as fourth in the general sires' list, but he doesn't get precocious horses and has settled at a median $67,500 (strong six-figure average) with his last couple of yearling crops.

Hard Spun nonetheless produced another 26 black-type performers in 2023, and cumulatively stands at No. 7 among active sires with several ratios (for instance, graded stakes winners/performers at 2.7/5.7 percent of named foals) uncannily in step with his old buddy Street Sense, who maintains a fee of $60,000.

It's gratifying to see that he remains fully subscribed, 151 mares last year showing that there are still plenty of breeders out there who recognise the importance not just of getting a winner under their mare, but a high-class winner. Hard Spun's stock goes on all surfaces, at all distances, and with those storied Darby Dan bloodlines behind him, it's no surprise that he should meanwhile be emerging as a broodmare influence. His daughters have lately produced a top-class miler in Europe in Alcohol Free (Ire) (No Nay Never), and no less an animal than Good Magic.

Somehow the world has spun against this horse, but it's very hard to see why.

Silver: AMERICAN PHAROAH
Pioneerof The Nile–Littleprincessemma (Yankee Gentleman)
Ashford Stud $50,000

Well, you can't win them all–even if you're Coolmore. Who could have said, for certain, which of their two Triple Crown winners would best replicate the talent that had confirmed the series to remain within the competence of a modern Thoroughbred? It was actually this one, having ended a generation of doubt, that started at the higher fee: he opened at $200,000 in 2016, and Justify at $150,000 three years later. The latter had been trimmed to $100,000 by the time he launched his first runners, in 2022; and American Pharoah had taken a proportionately deeper cut at the equivalent stage, to $110,000 for 2019. Their paths since, however, have forked radically. Justify is now out of sight, listed as private; and Pharoah enters 2024 suffering the indignity of yet another cut, this time down to $50,000 from $60,000.

American Pharoah | Sarah Andrew

Now there's no way that you can say he's any kind of dud, en route to oblivion. He finished 2023 at No. 6 in the general sires' list, with a seventh Grade I winner supplemented by no fewer than six others placed at the elite level–and that's taking no account of his success in Australia, including a G1 Victoria Derby winner. Yes, like most stallions on this farm, the volume behind him proves a double-edged sword when it comes to his ratios.

His 11 stakes winners arrived at 3.7 percent, pretty unexciting given the quality he must have been working with. But he continues to get his superior/graded action at a superior rate to ever-fashionable studmate Munnings, for instance, who commands a 50 percent higher fee.

The exotic seeding of American Pharoah's family was always liable to make the owners of top-class mares a little nervous, but his dam has proved a consistent producer so something has come together in dynamic fashion. Further action was plainly required after he assembled no more than 129 mares with last year's reduction, but if able to maintain his current sales performance–yearling median $150,000 with both his last two crops, averaging $210,164 in 2023–then you'll be looking at a very fair yield at his current price.

Both American Pharoah and Justify have proved effective sires on turf. If this fee proves a last roll of the dice, then I might impudently suggest once again that American Pharoah could be worth a spin in Co. Tipperary. But he's now within reach of a different type of American breeder, and that may well grant him a new lease of life.

Gold: UPSTART
Flatter–Party Silks (Touch Gold)
Airdrie Stud $30,000

So what is it, really, that we can hope to find at this level? I mean, we're obviously excluding “fantasy” breeding to untested stallions. But is there perhaps a horse out there hinting that he's pressing against the ceiling, and might soon be inaccessible? The other pair on the podium, admirable as they are, hardly fit that category. To me, however, Upstart is the dude in this tier who has the chance of elevating himself to a higher level yet.

Upstart | EquiSport

Maybe you were disappointed that he didn't follow through the 2022 deeds of Zandon and Kathleen O (among 63 named foals conceived at $10,000) with his next crop of sophomores? Well, that's because his third crop comprised just 27 live foals. Even so they included Prerequisite, a $47,000-to-$350,000 pinhook who won the GII Wonder Again S. on her first start outside maiden company, and then missed a Grade I by three parts of a length next time. Meanwhile, as we knew to expect from his own template (multiple Grade I-placed in three consecutive seasons), his mature stock kept him in the game with wins in races as resonant as the GII Clark and GII Woodward S.

He has punched conspicuously above weight at the sales, averaging $90,900 in 2022, but traded at just $39,434 from a modest book last year. But he's now ready to open a new cycle. His incoming yearlings emerge from a book of 151, saturation point for a farm that resists the opportunity of exposing their clients by inundating catalogues. Hiked to $30,000 last spring, he entertained another 153. When you consider what he has been doing with mediocre materials, this is a stallion on the point of a big move.

Despite a dual Grade I runner-up among his first juveniles, Upstart somehow remained bumping along at $10,000. Even so, his 13 stakes winners at 5.2 percent of named foals and 26 black-type performers at 10.4 percent compares with 5/12.2 percent for the lavishly supported Nyquist (standing at $85,000) in his own class; 4/9 percent for Practical Joke ($45,000) and 5.2/8.5 percent for Arrogate in the following intake; 5.9/9.4 percent for Justify and 4/11.1 percent for Bolt d'Oro ($60,000) in the one after that.

This is a horse that gets stock onto the track, and into the winner's circle: 53 percent winners to lifetime starters, compared with 46 percent for the soaraway hero of his intake, Not This Time; 41 percent for Nyquist; 43 percent even for the stellar Gun Runner, the same for Practical Joke, just 39 percent for Arrogate.

Upstart was cleverly named and, it now seems, aptly too. There are some curiosities sowing his family, but it's demonstrably all working. Perhaps the farm that gave us the sires of Uncle Mo and Into Mischief has again tapped into an unexpected seam of gold. With an incoming spike in quality and quantity, catch him while you can.

The post Value Sires For 2024 Part 6: Reaching The Snowline appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

Plenty of horses in this bracket have recently relinquished their brief window of commercial opportunity, and are now hanging around to discover whether they might join the very small group whose first runners generate a fresh vogue. Even with the newcomers out of the equation–we gave them a separate assessment, to open the series–we're left with three groups still untested on the track: those expecting their first foals; those who have just sold their first weanlings; and those actually about to dip a toe in the water with their first runners.

Pending that crossroads, many find themselves somewhat adrift against a bunch of older sires who have survived that test. These fit this tier either because they are losing stature or, more cheerfully, because they have carved out a viable niche as an affordable source of winners.

First the young guns. Of those who sent their first yearlings to auction this year, the ones who really nailed it, unsurprisingly, vaunted the kind of speed that pinhookers crave.

VOLATILE burned brightly in a light career, not seen again after confirming his Grade I caliber against a small but select field in the Vanderbilt. His 112 Beyer in the Aristides S. (1:07.57) was the highest of 2020 and duly secured 181 mares the following spring. Himself an $850,000 yearling, with a GI Test/GI Ballerina winner as granddam, his $125,431 average was boosted by a spectacular $1.15 million docket for a Book 1 filly at Keeneland in September. Nudged back up to $15,000 (from $12,500), Volatile has three hefty books behind him and will be the horse to beat for the freshman title next year.

But not even his median yield of 4.3 on his opening fee ($75,000/ $17,500) could match that of COMPLEXITY, whose $65,000 median (never mind his average $90,400!) multiplied his $12,500 fee by 5.2. Complexity started with some serious volume by the restrained standards of his farm, and then followed through with another three-figure book in his second season. He was clearly in the same vicinity as Volatile as a mature horse (110 Beyer in the GII Kelso) but was the more accomplished juvenile, wiring a Saratoga maiden (90 Beyer) before a decisive success in the GI Champagne S. on his second start. His half-sister ran second in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies, so their unraced dam is obviously channelling the good stuff.

VEKOMA is meanwhile working the Spendthrift system with remarkable efficiency, having started out (at $20,000) with staggering volume, entertaining at least 200 mares in each of his first three seasons. This year he processed 102 of his first yearlings at $98,432, albeit was unsurprisingly stretched somewhat thinner by a median of $60,000. Though confined to eight starts across three seasons, he was class from beginning to end, posting big numbers for his Grade I double in the Carter and Met Mile. From a stallion-producing family, he's a horse I've liked all the way through and everything is in place for him to look after many (albeit probably not all!) of his (very many!) clients at $15,000.

Knicks Go | Sarah Andrew

Among those in this intake offering rather more stretch, one or two suffered horrible yearling medians relative to conception fee. But one who made a solid start off $12,500 was Bolt d'Oro's half-brother GLOBAL CAMPAIGN: 74 yearlings sold at $63,195 (median $43,500). This was a more talented animal than generally appreciated and I can see him proving himself a bargain gateway to Curlin. A closer look at his family shows that it tends to produce faster types than are associated with the seeding sires, and Global Campaign's first crop of 126 live foals may surprise a few people with their dash.

Of those who sold their first weanlings this fall, meanwhile, the one that will sort out the sheep and the goats is KNICKS GO. No questioning his talent, it was just never quite obvious where it all came from–albeit his dam maintained stakes speed through four seasons. Those who didn't require a more familiar pedigree were delighted to see a Horse of the Year introduced at just $30,000. Well, now they can get him for half that, even though he's still nearly 18 months away from the opportunity to demonstrate whether or not he can replicate his brilliance! At this money, some people will surely want to roll the dice.

Even as it is, his weanlings sold a little better than those of SILVER STATE. But it's very early days for the latter, whose pedigree in contrast elucidates all the class he manifested as a runner. A friendly clip to $15,000 should hopefully keep him in the game because this horse equipped to prove a really wholesome influence.

The subsequent intake features some truly frightening books, but I will resist dwelling on that here. Suffice to say that those playing a longer game might quite like a filly by either SPEAKER'S CORNER or MYSTIC GUIDE. Both have taken an early trim at Darley, respectively to $17,500 and $12,500, and their pedigrees shout distaff influence.

We'll have to see how many of the youngsters will endure even in this relatively modest tier, a few years from now. Nor does a flying start bring any guarantees, as UNION RAGS could caution them. The halving of his fee to $15,000 acknowledges the way he has faltered, having stood at $60,000 between 2018 and 2020. Trade for his latest yearlings made this further cut imperative, but he's still the same horse that so quickly came up with five Grade I winners. Hopefully he will find a little oxygen now that he has descended to more accessible altitudes.

Studmate DAREDEVIL has taken his second cut since returning to the U.S., now down to $15,000, but of course it's only in 2024 that we'll get to assess the first juveniles conceived after Swiss Skydiver prompted his urgent repatriation. Their sales performance demanded a mild trim in fee, but he could easily be poised for fresh momentum.

MENDELSSOHN has also taken consecutive cuts, similarly now available at $15,000. He has so far been more about quantity than quality but his supporters will hope that he can still emulate four others, standing at the same fee, who have all done admirably to create a lasting foothold in this most slippery of markets.

The first of these, DIALED IN, is something of a blue-collar hero. He maintains such high volume–corralled 175 mares last spring, his 10th at stud–that it will always be hard, with the raw materials available at this level, to make his ratios “sing”. But Defunded has once again shown the caliber within his competence as his third elite scorer. Dialed In gets his work done at a fair tariff, and will keep plugging away to leave behind many of those now starting at multiples of his fee.

Cairo Prince | Sarah Andrew

CAIRO PRINCE has also created a sustainable brand for himself through six crops, as attested by a solid book of 129 mares last spring. A set-your-clock black-type producer throughout, he's now entering the territory where he can legitimately prove a mare–and of course he gets such a nice type, the average ($54,194) and median ($40,000) of his latest yearlings duly best among this proven quartet.

MIDSHIPMAN is a true yeoman and it's typical of this business that he should have had a quieter year (by his very special standards) both on the track and in the sales ring after finally doubling his fee to $20,000 last year–due recognition for having punched above weight for so long. His lifetime stats remain ridiculous for a stallion who has largely been a four-figure cover: 47 stakes winners at 6.4 percent of named foals, nine at graded stakes level; and 101 black-type performers overall, at 13.7 percent. The trim back to $15,000 brings him back towards the reach of breeders who most appreciate just what he can do for their mares.

KANTHAROS, who has really pulled himself up by his bootstraps, had another very solid year on the track. He has made the same slip in fee, reflecting a tepid book of mares last spring and a challenging yield on yearlings conceived at $30,000. But that was an experience shared by many sires exposed to a porous middle market, and the fact is that Kantharos lurks only just outside the top 10 in the 2023 general sires' list with a dozen stakes winners, including a couple at graded level. His lifetime ratio of stakes runners–11 percent of named foals–remains outstanding for a horse whose first five books were compiled in Florida at just $5,000.

He sired two Grade I winners at that fee, and now has another millionaire in Grade II winner Bay Storm. The first of his two $30,000 books were juveniles this year, and we know how they will keep thriving. That guarantees Kantharos imminently entry into the top 20 active sires on lifetime earnings. All he needs to do is supplant… Lookin At Lucky!

VALUE PODIUM

Bronze Medal: CONNECT
Curlin–Bullville Belle (Holy Bull)
Lane's End $15,000

Connect | Sarah Andrew

Amid all this talk about stud fees being too high, credit is overdue to Lane's End for anticipating the mood in the room. From Flightline down, the farm made 11 cuts across their 2024 roster. All were meaningful, and some nearly brutal, effectively conceding that one or two stallions were drifting into trouble and needed some decisive help. Bravo! The very opposite of burying your head in the sand, and in the present environment I hope it works out both for the farm and its clients.

One stallion who can certainly benefit is Connect, restored from $25,000 to his 2021 fee of $15,000 after the crop conceived that year returned a tepid median (albeit a perfectly acceptable $45,774 average) at the yearling sales. He'd also suffered a real slump in his book last spring, down to 45 from 172 in 2022! But we're accustomed to seeing horses treated like this, once they have served their commercial purpose, and should sooner marvel at the impression he must have made with his first crop to get such a big book (up from 93 in 2021) in his fifth year at stud.

Sure enough, only Gun Runner and Practical Joke banked more prizemoney as freshmen in 2021, and only Gun Runner had more winners. Unfortunately Connect did not then consolidate especially well, but he has made a timely return to form this year with eight stakes winners, three at graded level, plus a GI Kentucky Oaks third in The Alys Look. Moreover, his first-crop flagship, the juvenile Grade I winner Rattle N Roll, failed by just half a length to add another elite score in the GI Stephen Foster S. That horse was a $55,000 weanling but has now banked $1.7 million across three seasons.

Connect's pedigree is not without its challenges but he's another to bring Curlin within range and had real prowess as a racehorse, a blip in the Travers his only defeat in seven starts (four triple-digit Beyers) up the grades after debut. He outkicked none other than Gun Runner in the GII Pennsylvania Derby and, while he won't be doing that again any time soon, he's actually siring winners at a higher percentage of named foals.

With that bumper crop of weanlings in the pipeline, and now a lenient fee, this looks a good time to re-Connect.

Silver Medal: KARAKONTIE (Jpn)
Bernstein–Sun Is Up (Jpn) (Sunday Silence)
Gainesway $15,000

Karakontie | Sarah Andrew

How pleasing to see this undervalued stallion moving his book back up last year, up to 86 from 48. Perhaps his hour has come at last, now that the minority prepared to breed to a quality turf sire in the Bluegrass have been deprived of English Channel and Kitten's Joy.

If you're enlightened enough to see the growing need for turf quality in the U.S., then you might also recognize that you don't always have to fly first class to Tattersalls. With a fifth crop on the track, Karakontie has still only had 174 starters, but seven have won graded stakes. For the second year running, moreover, he had an elite scorer in She Feels Pretty, winner of the GI Natalma S. before failing by barely half a length to overcome a wide trip in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf. Karakontie's premier earner Princess Grace meanwhile continued to thrive in Australia, missing Group 1 scores by a neck and half a length.

Even after a hike from $10,000, Karakontie is an awful lot of horse for this fee. He converted some of the most regal blood in the book–his third dam is Miesque herself–into a turn of foot that won him a Group 1 at two and then a mile Classic, before doing all he could to endear the American market in the GI Breeders' Cup Mile. Don't forget that he restores Sunday Silence to the Bluegrass through his dam, herself out of a half-sister to Kingmambo. His international pedigree and participation alike are a measure of our debt to the program that produced him.

The American market has not really grasped its privilege, with this horse, but the elevation in his fee tells you everything you need to know: he's being used by people who want to breed a runner, whether in their own silks or to boost a mare. Actually, Karakontie is perfectly capable of a home run at the sales, including the $525,000 filly at Keeneland in September whose buyers will have been delighted to see her full-sister (who herself made $280,000 the previous year) win the Tepin S. last month. His lesser specimens may struggle commercially, until the environment improves, but that won't trouble those eccentrics who calculate value according to the odds of ending up with a runner.

Gold Medal: MITOLE
Eskendereya–Indian Miss (Indian Charlie)
Spendthrift $15,000

How naïve of me to imagine that all those commercial breeders who flocked to the new sires in 2020 wanted nothing more than to land on the champion freshman of 2023. Because Mitole, as he closes in on those laurels, finds himself the only one of the four Spendthrift sires dominating this table to remain on the same fee in 2024.

Mitole | Louise Reinagel

Now, clearly this farm needs no help in how to make their remarkable machine run smoothly. The Spendthrift team know that Mitole was the one who took the biggest slide of the quartet, in the inevitable slackening of demand for their second crop of yearlings. But they had already ensured that these were conceived more affordably, trimming him from $25,000 in his debut season to $15,000. That was partly a concession to the Covid market, but it also offered such obvious value about a champion sprinter that he maintained the enthusiastic support of 184 mares even last spring, after topping 200 in each of his three previous seasons.

In other words, the system is functioning smoothly and Mitole has played his part so well that he approaches the winning post with a narrow advantage over Maximus Mischief (my serial “gold” pick, I might add, after starting at $7,500!) by prizemoney and also a wafer-thin one by individual winners (32 from 79 starters).

Whether or not he holds out, Mitole is the only one of the four to have a graded stakes scorer–and so joins Flameaway and Solomini in what has been a weirdly unproductive group, by that measure-in GIII Pocahontas S. winner/GI Alcibiades runner-up V V's Dream.

The precocious Maximus Mischief has shown a lot more of his hand (77 starters from 122 named foals) and remember that Mitole (79 from 145) himself only squeezed in a single start at two, in late November. It was as a 4-year-old that he racked up his four Grade Is–including that resonant Met Mile/Breeders' Cup Sprint double, and a stakes record at the intermediate distance in the Forego. So it seems fair to suggest that he has only just got started.

By now Mitole has surely stifled misgivings about his sire, himself after all a brilliant performer and a conduit of corresponding genes. Eskendereya's fifth dam is Cosmah, and doubles up her half-sister's son Northern Dancer top and bottom. It was presumably his unfashionable sire that confined Mitole to $20,000 as a yearling–but then along came kid brother Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow), himself a $17,000 short yearling, to reiterate the merit of a family cultivated by the late Edward A. Cox Jr.

Hot Rod Charlie has now followed Eskendereya to Japan, where they have made a habit of exposing crass commercial trends in Kentucky. But here's a horse making the family assets work even in this less imaginative environment, and his debut at the 2-year-old sales–behind only Omaha Beach in the key freshman medians–suggest that Mitole will be taking out a long lease on the attention of pinhookers.

Sires In The Teens: Breeder Selections

Aidan O'Meara, Stonehaven Steadings

Aidan O'Meara | Keeneland

Gold Medal: Volatile
One of the best angles for success in the commercial breeding field is identifying a future leading stallion in the early stages and this sometimes requires taking a leap of faith breeding when their first runners are about to run. Volatile has been the breakout star at the yearling sales this year, mirroring his sire's first crop results a few years back. He's a beautifully built horse himself and passed his physique on with remarkable consistency. He's been very well supported by breeders and will have plenty of ammo in his first few crops to give him every opportunity. If his offspring have legitimate ability, he will skyrocket up the stallion ranks and $15,000 will look like the deal of the decade.

Silver Medal: Connect
The crop of 2021 has all been overshadowed by Gun Runner's incredible achievements, but Connect has been quietly developing a very solid career for himself. He has shown consistency with three graded stakes winners again this year and a strong supporting cast of stakes horses. He has also shown the ability to get the all-important high-class horse with Rattle N Roll. He measures well in all statistical categories and looks to be a stallion that can establish himself long term in the mold of a Midshipman/First Samurai/Blame type.

Bronze Medal: Audible
The Spendthrift quartet has garnered most of the attention from this year's freshmen and rightly so but one horse is simmering just below these and that horse is Audible. His 14% stakes horses with his first 2-year-olds cannot be ignored and his own racing career suggests there is more improvement to be had as they mature. He's a beautiful horse that can throw the right kind as witnessed by his first crop of yearlings. $15,000 is very intriguing for a horse with some potential future upswing and worst-case scenario has shown plenty of ability for longer term success at this price point.

Peter O'Callaghan, Woods Edge Farm

Peter O'Callaghan | Fasig-Tipton

Gold Medal: Midshipman
This stallion has been very good to us both on the track and in the sales ring. We recently bred first-time-out 2-year-old winner Midshipman's Dance; pinhooked Grade II winner Special Reserve; bred Leucothea and co-bred Amidst Waves, both of whom are multiple stakes winning 2-year-olds. He is a very consistent and well-respected sire, standing for an affordable $15,000. You can sell one well at the sales and he produces winners every weekend at the track.

Silver Medal: Mitole
Obviously a brilliant racehorse and looks to be turning out some good 2-year-old winners this second half of the year. Must be a horse worth a punt at $15,000. We are breeding to him again this year.

Bronze Medal: Vekoma
A brilliant racehorse, a high class 2-year-old who trained on, winning some high-profile races in the GII Bluegrass S. going two turns at three. Then winning the GI Carter H. and GI Met Mile at four in impressive fashion. Furthermore, he is a very well-bred son of Candy Ride (Arg), out of the GISW Speightstown mare Mona De Momma from the family of Mr. Greeley.

He is a good-looking horse who seems to sire plenty of good-looking stock. We have bred to him each year and have bought foals by him in each crop, he has not let us down so far.

I think he is a horse with a legitimate shot to be a sire standing at an affordable fee of $15,000.

The post Value Sires For 2024, Part 4: Into The Teens appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

Even at this end of the market, the perennial dilemma remains that value means different things to different people. A breeder operating at this level tends to appreciate every cent of a commercial return, however marginal. If your belt is already at the last notch, then the understandable inclination is to leave any selfless consideration of the breed's wider interests to those who can better afford it. Nonetheless I would persist in the view that anyone who believes in a mare can do her no better service than try to put a winner on the page.

Many stallions in this bracket are barely clinging to a place in the Bluegrass, even though in many cases they have had little or no opportunity to show what their mature stock can do on the racetrack. We know that the commercial compulsion towards new sires is double-edged, in that they are abandoned just as promptly as they were embraced only a year previously. And once a sire is reckless enough actually to start testing his genetic prowess by fielding runners, the game really is up for most.

Even the few that make a good start on the track tend to find their books and sales yield both on the slide. As a result, the types that are entitled to need a little more time tend to find themselves almost wholly abandoned. If you're keeping the faith with your stallion, all you can do is stand him at this kind of fairly token fee pending the testimonials of the winner's circle. The trouble is that even an excellent ratio of track success, when your volume is so low, will be submerged by “yet another stakes winner” advertised for rivals who may have 500 more foals on the ground across their first three crops.

The trick, among the younger sires, is to distinguish between those lurking at this level only pending a breakout, and those who are merely clinging to hang on. Because we must never forget that Into Mischief himself once spent a couple of years languishing at $7,500.

An alternative source of value at this level is a handful of stalwarts who have quietly carved out a respectable niche of service for breeders of modest means and realistic ambitions; plus a few younger ones who appear on course for that kind of yeoman viability.

Take TAPITURE, for instance. He was launched with plenty of volume: in fact, in his intake only American Pharoah has more named foals. Granted that the quality clearly couldn't match the quantity, at this level, his ratios will probably never be very startling. But he has shown himself able to get plenty of black-type action with an adequate mare and, while Repo Rocks this year became only his second domestic graded stakes winner, his 111 Beyer in blitzing the GIII Toboggan S. and a runner-up finish in the GI Carter together complement the Classic-placed Jesus' Team as evidence that someday Tapiture is going to land an elite score at just $7,500.

At the same fee, his farm has not managed to muster anything like the same demand for COUNTRY HOUSE, who had to make do with just 119 mares across his first three books and endured corresponding inattention for his first yearlings. But he did sell one for $250,000, and I hope he can similarly defy the odds once he gets a foothold on the track over the next couple of years. His inherent merit was lost in all the blather about the horse he supplanted in the Derby, but his performance there was absolutely consistent with the progress he'd been making and it was terribly unfortunate that he never had the chance to corroborate his breakout–especially after the gamble of trying again the following year left him even more of a forgotten horse. It's ridiculous that so many of those that finished behind him at Churchill were launched with huge books at much higher fees. Country House's sire was always scandalously underrated, but he's inbred to the Sam-Son matriarch No Class (Nodouble) and could certainly breed a horse capable of attending to his unfinished business with the Derby.

Country House | Matt Goins

Darby Dan is definitely worth a visit for those working to this kind of budget, then, as a look at our podium will confirm, and the same is true of Airdrie. True, a couple of that farm's most attractive options demand a little nerve, in that they must negotiate the tricky chicane between small books and the maturity of their first stock, but both are now a bet to virtually nothing at $5,000.

Nobody could have expected PRESERVATIONIST to set the world on fire overnight, having won his Grade I at six, but he's had 13 juvenile winners already from 41 starters-a ratio that matches or beats many peers working from monster books. Unsurprisingly, in the world we live in, his second crop were quiet at the sales but earlier transactions of $280,000, $260,000 and $250,000 show the kind of stamp of horse he can produce. And there are few stallions in any bracket with a better shape to their pedigree, with King Ranch queens Courtly Dee and Too Chic standing opposite each other. I'd be amazed if Preservationist doesn't make a broodmare sire.

DIVISIDERO was never going to cause a stampede, either, having been so recklessly “uncommercial” as to advertise his constitution on the racetrack until the age of seven. He duly had a small debut crop, prompting little interest at the yearling sales, but from this tiny foothold he has mustered a very talented horse in Vote No, whose three starts to date comprise maiden/stakes/length defeat in a Grade II. He had a good winner at Gulfstream just last week, too, leaving him top of the freshmen table by earnings per starter. In the meantime, the eight yearlings sold from his second crop, again very small, included a colt and filly that each made six figures at the September Sale.

So Divisidero is hinting, to those who pay heed, that he could yet claim a role in filling the void left by the loss of his sire Kitten's Joy. Remember that his two GI Woodford Reserve Turf Classics, 13 triple-digit Beyers and length defeat in the GI Breeders' Cup Mile have a genetic bedrock in none other than Cosmah as fifth dam.

The crass neglect of turf sires also requires us to draw attention to DEMARCHELIER (GB) at $7,500. His unfortunate derailment, after an immaculate start to his career, required Bluegrass breeders to show uncharacteristic breadth of perspective by grasping their good fortune in having access not only to a son of the European great Dubawi (Ire) but also to an outstanding Classic family. Demarchelier's first crop will not come fully into their own until stretching out at three, but a perfectly respectable start by his American juveniles is not even half the story, with a youngster Group-placed in France from a handful of starters over there.

His veteran neighbor at Claiborne, FIRST SAMURAI, is a seriously productive horse to be standing at the same fee. He's actually inside the top 20 active stallions on lifetime earnings, and it's very scrupulous of the farm to advertise only six millionaires when he also has one who came up cents short at $999,000! That's not enough for the typical breeder, apparently, as he's only getting small books nowadays. But if you want to put a winner under your mare, here's a Hopeful/Champagne winner by Giant's Causeway for a fraction of the price required to reach many horses of less accomplishment who have yet to sire the winner of a maiden claimer.

TOM'S D'ETAT won't have a runner himself until next year yet has somehow just suffered a third consecutive fee cut, from an opening $17,500 to $7,500. That reflects the modest commercial traction of his first yearlings, but on the racetrack he achieved a high level with maturity-nine consecutive triple-digit Beyers-and he's by a sire of sires out of Giant's Causeway mare whose own mother was a sister to Candy Ride (Arg). Tom's D'Etat has every right to sire runners at a fee that minimises those risks equally attached to more expensive but similarly unproven horses.

That said, there's no denying the superior impression made by the first yearlings presented by CARACARO. They were processed at an average of $41,745 from a base of just $6,500, thanks partly to a filly who brought $175,000. In exemplary hands at Crestwood, Caracaro also kept some good company in a light track career and has a physique reminiscent of his expensive sire.

By the way, before we proceed to our Value Podium, don't forget that we surveyed the new sires separately in the first part of this series. That was on the premise that they seldom offer sufficient value, strictly on their merits, to have any chance of a podium against the proven horses in the higher brackets. But that wouldn't apply to a couple we highlighted at this level: the teak-tough and classy SMOOTH LIKE STRAIT is almost insulted by a fee of just $3,500, while LOGGINS actually mounted the top step of the newcomers' podium at $7,500.

Copper Bullet | Matt Goins

VALUE PODIUM

Bronze: COPPER BULLET

More Than Ready ex Allegory (Unbridled's Song)

Darby Dan $7,500

Bronze for Copper? Why not, when this horse has been the medium of a pioneering experiment: not only complimentary covers for mares that satisfied certain selection criteria, but a $5,000 award to their owners once certified in foal!

Nor have their dividends stopped there. The first intimation that the novel strategy was paying off came at the 2-year-old sales, when 11 members of Copper Bullet's debut crop-comprising 34 named foals-achieved the fourth-highest median ($65,000) among new sires, headlined by colts selling at Ocala for $275,000 and $260,000. He then did something even more unusual by actually advancing the yield realised by his second crop of yearlings. At a time when even those of his peers who had made a flying start with their first runners were suffering from the usual slide-so fatuously do purchasers follow the herd-the handful representing his second crop at the sales achieved a median ($55,000) surpassed, among Kentucky sires, only by Omaha Beach.

After another restricted book this spring, Copper Bullet will surely be generating demand after producing Copper Tax to win five off the reel, including two stakes (one by nearly seven lengths), before flattening out from a messy trip in the GII Remsen S. Overall Copper Bullet has had half a dozen winners from 19 starters, including another placed in stakes company.

It all stands to reason, for a four-length winner of the GII Saratoga Special who flashed residual talent at both three and four despite only fitful visits to the track. With a classy French family behind him, his innovative showcasing may turn out to give us plenty more to think about.

Silver: GREATEST HONOUR

Tapit ex Tiffany's Honour (Street Cry {Ire})

Spendthrift $7,500

This farm's system has adapted very well to the upgrading of its roster over recent years but here we have a horse combining a hint of elite caliber at the kind of basement fee that first made the model work. Having duly welcomed 178 mares into his debut book, he's surely going to produce a headliner or two to maintain momentum through the crossroads ahead. As ever, with high volume, you'd want to be taking one of his nicer specimens to market. But plenty of commercial breeders will be happy to accept those terms for such a lenient fee.

On the racetrack Greatest Honour ultimately proved an anti-climax but only after showing ample to suggest that he had inherited a functioning line to one of the great modern families. And at least his fading has brought affordable access to those aristocratic genes, with second and fourth dams both Broodmares of the Year, divided by a GI Kentucky Oaks winner.

Greatest Honour took four starts to break his maiden, but that was fair enough when he was sharing an education with Olympiad, Speaker's Corner and Known Agenda, and he duly beat a subsequent Grade II winner when doing so. Improvement was barely required, then, in making a dazzling emergence on the Derby trail in the GIII Holy Bull S. and GII Fountain of Youth S. He was so strong at the wire in these races that it was a jolt when he could not follow through in the GI Florida Derby, but he disappeared for a year and never really retrieved the thread.

As we've indicated, this horse straddles the divide in that busy Spendthrift covering shed. He's standing at the kind of commercial fee that brings corresponding numbers behind him. But he definitely had a ton of class, far more than his final profile suggests, and recycles genes that could produce any kind. Few stallions at this level will appeal to the breeder who wouldn't mind keeping a filly, but that's a measure of the way Greatest Honour has all bases covered.

Gold: HIGHLY MOTIVATED

Into Mischief ex Strong Incentive (Warrior's Reward)

Airdrie $7,500

I'm going to put it on the line here and declare that this is the value play, hands down, among all the aspiring young sires in Kentucky.

Highly Motivated resides at a farm that strives to price stallions fairly without making breeders pay another way by flooding the catalogues. The 141 mares he covered last year represents a maximum subscription, by its restrained standards, and reflects what a talented runner he was. We'll return to that, but the big news is what has happened to his page since.

If pressed, I suspect that Airdrie might have conceded that the only reason he launched at a fee this low was that it wasn't totally clear that his young dam, albeit a black-type winner in a light career, had much genetic back-up to complement the brilliance we know to expect from Into Mischief. But now look!

Since he went to stud, the two named foals she had delivered since Highly Motivated-only her third and fourth overall-have both emerged as elite performers. The 3-year-old by Flintshire (GB), Surge Capacity, has emerged from nowhere to be beaten by a single rival in five starts, winning a maiden, two grade IIIs and now the GI Matriarch S. And the 2-year-old filly by Practical Joke produced the debut of the Saratoga meet, geared down by 12¾ lengths for a 90 Beyer, before enduring a horror trip and still failing by only half a length to run down Brightwork (Outwork) in the GI Spinaway S.

Combine those new talents with Highly Motivated himself, and you're looking at a mare entering blue hen territory at the age of 11. Throw in the expensive genes of his sire, and it's hard to resist reminding ourselves that Into Mischief himself once stood at exactly this fee.

A quick refresher: Highly Motivated beat no less a horse than Known Agenda (Curlin) in his maiden before breaking the Keeneland track record in his stakes debut, clocking the second highest juvenile Beyer of his crop. After a messy stakes debut, he probably did himself a disservice in pushing champion Essential Quality so hard in the GII Blue Grass S., just run out of it by a neck, as he left connections no choice but to stretch his speed on the first Saturday in May. His Derby turned into one of those that require an 11-month lay-off, yet he regrouped to claim another track record-one previously held for 37 years by a Horse of the Year-in the GIII Monmouth Cup.

Look, this is a horse with something for everyone. He's a commercial no-brainer, yet benefits from the relative market protection of a commendably restrained farm. And he has just enjoyed a freakish genetic upgrade that creates just as much interest for breeders playing a longer game, as well. Much as had always been true of our silver medallist, Highly Motivated now offers cut-price access to elite blood for anyone who would be happy to retain a filly. Among the four-figure options, no other stallion has this kind of five-star appeal.

Highly Motivated | Sarah Andrew

Value Sires under $10,000: the Breeders Speak

We asked breeders to weigh in on who their top picks were.

George Adams of Housatonic Bloodstock serves as the Director of Stallions and Breeding for Wasabi Ventures.

GOLD: Tapiture (Tapit-Free Spin, by Olympio), Darby Dan Farm, $7,500.

Tapiture would be my best value pick at under $10,000 in Kentucky. For me, value at this price point is about a horse's ability to get runners rather than explicitly commercial considerations, and Tapiture has a high percentage of runners to foals, and an excellent winners/runners ratio. He also has a strong 4.7% stakes winners/foals aged 3 and up. His 11.3% stakes horses/foals is solid as well.  Plus he can get you a two-year-old, which we all like to have. He has 25 juvenile winners already in 2023, with a pair of black-type winners and five more that are stakes-placed. To me, that makes him very good value and an excellent choice with which to start off a young mare–especially since his physical makes him easy to breed to.

SILVER: Demarchelier (GB) (Dubawi {Ire})-Loveisallyouneed (Ire), by Sadler's Wells), Claiborne Farm, $7,500.

Demarchelier is a really interesting horse at this level. With the start that he's off to with his first crop this year, he has a big chance to make it as one of the next good turf stallions here, I think. His CI shows that he didn't get the best book of mares for these first foals, which isn't unexpected for a two-turn turf horse by Dubawi in Kentucky. But despite his own later-maturing tendencies and that lack of support, he's got double-digit winners to his credit already with far fewer foals than some of the top freshmen. His winners have come in good maiden special weight races, and he has a Group horse in France and a good stakes colt in New York.  He's also had some dirt winners, which doesn't hurt his chances. He's a horse that I could see standing for more down the road (and he got a bump for '24), and I think that makes him good value this year.

BRONZE: Instagrand (Into Mischief-Assets of War, by Lawyer Ron), Taylor Made Stallions, $7,500.

Typically I have a hard time calling an unproven stallion a good “value” just because I think that it has to be a function of their ability to get runners. But in the case of Instagrand, who will have his first two-year-olds next year, I think he's got so many things going for him that he counts as value this coming spring. He was the first seven-figure sales son of Into Mischief, and he was so precocious–which you can easily see why by looking at him–I have a hard time believing that he's not going to be giving Authentic a run for his money at the top of the freshman sire list next year. At 190 mares bred in that first year, he'll have plenty of ammunition, and we all know the quality of some of the mares that Larry Best sent to him, which will set him apart from some of the others at this prince point. His first crop have sold well, and the ones that I have seen have looked quick and early. So when they come out firing early next year and put Instagrand right at the top of the freshman sire list, I think that'll make his '24 fee look like pretty good value.

Andrew Cary, Cary Bloodstock

Gold: Loggins (Ghostzapper-Beyond Blame, by Blame), Hill 'n' Dale Farms, $7,500.

Excellent physical, high-level talent, and the pedigree to succeed. He was a pricey Saratoga yearling and ran to his looks. Beaten a nose by champion Forte in a Grade I and looks like a slam dunk under $10k as a first year sire with big upside. Hill 'n' Dale has an excellent reputation developing stallions with his profile such as Army Mule and Maclean's Music.

Silver: Instagrand

Into Mischief has already sired the likes of Practical Joke, Maximus Mischief, and Goldencents and his reputation as a sire of sires will only grow in the future. Instagrand was a precocious and brilliant 2-year-old and he should have lots of early runners next summer with his first crop. His first crop of yearlings averaged over $44k this year.

Bronze: Beau Liam (Liam's Map-Belle of Perintown, by Denere), Airdrie Stud, $6,000.

He had elite talent and his first few races were jaw-dropping. Another beautiful physical, he has all the ingredients to succeed and has been well supported for an under $10k sire. His first foals look the part and were well-received at the November sales.

The post Value Sires For 2024–Part II: Stallions Under $10,000 appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

This time round, value feels likely to prove quite elusive. With the middle market increasingly porous, stud fees overall are at a challenging level. If they were driven up by a long bull run in international bloodstock, that appears to be tapering away and there's evidently going to be quite a lag before we see any kind of relief in fees.

Instead of assessing each annual intake, and judging how its members are meeting challenges particular to a phase of their career, this year we're going to tackle them by price bands. Previously a mediocre group has sometimes left us scratching around for a horse for the Value Podium, while much better sires in stronger year groups enjoyed no such elevation. So we're simply going to work to a budget, and the full range of options within it–which, after all, is what every breeder has to do. We'll start with sires below $10,000, and work our way up through the tiers.

The one exception comes today, when we acknowledge that new sires are always a class apart. On the one hand, they are priced to exploit commercial prejudice and seldom turn out to have offered value relative to their eventual competence. Almost all will turn out to be standing at a career-high fee; and many will be packing their bags, whether for overseas or Oklahoma, even before the claims now being made on their behalf are validly tested by mature crops. Nonetheless many breeders will be focusing all their attention on this group.

The defeat of the proposed 140 cap appeared to stimulate some pointedly unfettered books last time round, when a rookie turf sprinter covered 293 mares. Regardless of the merits of that debate, and indeed of that horse, it really can't be healthy for so many mares to be corralled by unproven stallions that will mostly fail. As we've often conceded, however, it's hard to blame either commercial breeders or the stallion farms. The former need to put bread on the table, never easy; the latter, equally, can no longer bank on market interest even into a second year. (In other words, if you want fees to come down, don't just flit from one new sire to the next.)

The situation is really driven by the agents and managers driving the spending at ringside. This series will hope to challenge the refrain that breeders have no choice but to roll the dice on newcomers because proven sires are too expensive. In fact, that's exactly why we're giving the newcomers separate consideration today: few, if any, would have had a prayer of making a Value Podium in a price band shared by stallions who have actually got horses out there winning stakes. The truth about buyers' behavior is evident from the way yearling averages tend to slide markedly in the second crop even for stallions whose first runners make a flying start-as happened this year, for instance, to all four of the sires who have dominated the freshman table! (Champion elect Mitole, for instance, processed his second crop at $48,423, down from $104,638 with his first.)

We'll leave for another day the puzzle why breeding “for the sale ring” should be any different from “breeding for the track.” As I'm always saying, there should be nothing more commercial than putting a winner under your mare. The only real argument for unproven sires is self-fulfilling, in that most will never again repeat the quality and quantity of their debut books. Otherwise, investment is being directed precisely where it is most likely to fail. But each to their own, right? There's a proving ground out there, with a wooden stick at the end, and this is a great environment for anyone mating a mare with the quaint objective of breeding a runner.

So let's immerse ourselves in this perilous whirlpool of new sires, and at least try to make the gamble affordable as we seek the handful that will eventually manage to swim clear and build a viable stud career in the Bluegrass.

As indicated, that won't be easy in the current market. For a sense of where the typical commercial breeder is operating, we can calculate the median fee of the top 10 new sires in each of the past six years. This was $22,500 in 2019; $27,500 in 2020; $25,000 in 2021, as farms made a pandemic gesture; $40,000 in 2022; $35,000 in 2023; and it is again $35,000 for this latest intake.

So the typical cost of using a new sire has gone up by over half (56 percent) in the last six years, during which time the average banked for a Keeneland September yearling has risen only 13 percent. And you still don't want to use a proven horse?

Well, okay, if you insist. Let's take a look at the class of '24. But remember that this whole exercise, while undertaken with every effort at objectivity, is just one guy's opinion. You know what your mare looks like-which should, after all, be the starting point for every mating-and you know what physique would complement her best.

OVERVIEW OF THE CLASS

The retiring cohort is led by two sons of Curlin who have given an extra twist of speed to his established influence. That said, both shared another of his trademarks by thriving with maturity. Both, indeed, required four sophomore starts to win a maiden, Elite Power in September and Cody's Wish in October. So we'll have to see whether or not their brilliance will express itself on a pattern more conventional for sons of Curlin out of Seattle Slew line mares.

Elite Power | Sarah Andrew

Both those mares were elite runners themselves, of course, as a GI Kentucky Oaks runner-up and GI Gazelle S. winner respectively. The latter, Dance Card, showed conspicuous speed for a daughter of Tapit when placing in the GI Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Sprint, and had laid the ground for Cody's Wish by producing Endorsed (Medaglia d'Oro), the throwback talent who has this year won graded races in his sixth season. Elite Power meanwhile underpins his credentials with a half-sister to proven sire Dialed In as second dam, besides champion Eliza (Mt Livermore) as his fourth.

Both will take little finding but rather more funding, CODY'S WISH introduced at $75,000 and ELITE POWER at $50,000. While we all love a Met Mile winner, I'm not sure anyone could sensibly assert that there's a 50 percent difference in their potential at this stage.

GUNITE got a rear view of each, in his respective Breeders' Cup starts, but proved a handful for Elite Power in their two meetings in Saratoga this summer, running him to a head in the first and then beating him in GI Forego. And he has an edge in precocity, having won the GI Hopeful S. by nearly six lengths, enabling him to start at $40,000. His maternal family is seeded by some fairly arcane names, but the first three dams are stakes winners so it's demonstrably all working.

By the way, while we quickly learned to expect the unexpected from Gun Runner, perhaps we should pay more heed to the fact that Cody's Wish, Elite Power and Gunite were all presumably bred with two turns in mind. Quality tells, however it expresses itself. You want a Hopeful/Forego winner? Then you don't necessarily want to join a long line for a “commercial” sprinter.

Gunite | Sara Gordon

As for those who did end up with a Triple Crown agenda this year, we'll see who ends up with Eclipse laurels but the farms have meanwhile sought to anticipate the votes of breeders, with juvenile champion FORTE ($50,000) still ahead of ARCANGELO ($35,000), MAGE ($25,000) and TWO PHIL'S ($12,500).

The world was still at Forte's feet when he added the GI Florida Derby to three elite scores at two, but a couple of his contemporaries rather caught up with him. With hindsight, as the far less experienced horse, Mage's performance that day actually turned out to be the more significant pointer. But obviously commercial breeders will prize Forte's precocity, the Derby and Belmont winners both being later developers.

No newcomer has a better genetic base than Arcangelo, whose third dam is Better Than Honour, yet was found as a yearling for exactly the same price we must now pay for single cover! Hard to argue with that, given the way he followed up his Belmont breakout in the deepest sophomore field of the year at Saratoga.

Mage did not show his true colors there, but let's not lose sight of the historic level of talent required to progress so rapidly from a standing start, unraced until Jan. 28. He's gone to a farm that prices horses fairly without flooding the catalogue, and his brother's GII Remsen performance has meanwhile opened an exciting door.

That's the kind of thing that would help Two Phil's, who has an inescapably plain page. But you had to love the way he followed up a shatteringly game Derby effort on what sadly proved his only subsequent start, and the bottom line is that Danzig's last big star has covered a graded stakes sprinter and come up with something special.

Another star sophomore entering the ranks is ARABIAN LION, at $30,000. He's surely set for pinhooker shortlists as a $600,000 2-year-old who followed through to clock big numbers in the GI Woody Stephens, but those taking a longer view will also be satisfied to find Justify underpinned by Personal Ensign as third dam.

Pappacap | Sarah Andrew

TAIBA was an even more spectacular pinhook ($140,000 to $1.7 million) and paid it all back on the racetrack, winning the GI Santa Anita Derby off a maiden win and flaunting his speed when dropping back for the GI Malibu. Sticking around to run in the desert did not pay off, except maybe for breeders who might conceivably have been asked for a little more than $35,000 a year ago. Like Gunite, Taibia suggests the upgrading powers of their sire: his family owes most of its distinction to Ohio-breds, but his dam's 17 wins would be pretty remarkable in any currency.

PROXY, like Taiba, ran third in the GI Breeders' Cup Classic and that was a fitting conclusion to four seasons of set-your-clock Tapit action that left him just a tick below the very best (starts on $25,000) while thoroughly deserving his Grade I in the Clark. That hard-knocking profile befits the combination of his sire-line with a third dam also by Seattle Slew, and his dual Grade I-winning dam Panty Raid (Include) has corroborated her genetic input–sister a GI Kentucky Oaks runner-up–with a Grade II-winning daughter.

Among the more affordable newcomers, ZANDON appeals strongly at $12,500 as a horse rather more talented than generally appreciated. That's a curious suggestion of one whose consistency banked over $2 million through three campaigns in the best company, but he seldom found the right scenario to showcase that turn of foot. Even as it stands, he looks a lot of horse for this kind of money. I guess someone who could stretch for his aptly-named sire should still do so, but at this level Zandon is entitled to give Upstart fresh kudos.

DR. SCHIVEL will be in commercial demand at the same fee, as a Grade I winner at two and then also in the GI Bing Crosby S. He was beaten only two heads in his defense of that trophy, and only by a nose in the GI Breeders' Cup Sprint in between. His family carries a few faded names, but his dam is a half-sister to a Grade I winner and the blood was plainly functioning in a horse so consistently fast.

The Walmac revival meanwhile gains ground with a couple of eligibly priced recruits. PAPPACAP is assured traffic at $12,500 as a precocious son of Gun Runner, while FULSOME gives bargain access to Into Mischief at $7,500 after converting his Juddmonte page to the margin of elite performance.

War Horse Place is also showing ambition, bringing Classic winner Rombauer in from the cold at $6,000, while SMOOTH LIKE STRAIT has every right to sire runners at a bargain $3,500. This teak-tough and classy horse definitely warrants a look, having repeatedly missed adding to his solitary Grade I score only by narrow margins, including a head, a neck (twice), and half a length. He earned $1.8 million across four full campaigns and has a bunch of top runners and producers under his third dam. Do not make the mistake of assuming that his basement fee limits the kind of breeder who should be interested in recycling his merit in an expanding turf program.

VALUE PODIUM
Bronze:
UP TO THE MARK (Not This Time–Belle's Finale, by Ghostzapper)
Lane's End $25,000

Up to the Mark | Coady Photography

Here's a horse that taught a couple of valuable lessons for anyone smart enough to heed them. One is that the fearless approach can pay off even if you're beaten: the decision to risk a new distance at the Breeders' Cup, against a vintage group of Euro raiders, was arguably only thwarted by a dream trip for the winner and enabled Up to the Mark to tell us something new about himself–something that made us all think still more highly of him. Meanwhile the GI Mile was won by a horse he had nailed in their previous start, confirming his caliber at that trip.

But a still more important lesson concerned a different type of versatility. Because our horses will only expand their boundaries if we push our own, and Up to the Mark's career confirms what has long been obvious to any student of pedigrees: even when horses might have an obvious surface, on paper, we have to remember that races aren't staged on paper. How many other talents remain unfulfilled, you wonder, because they are campaigned in prescriptive fashion?

As it is, the slavish orthodoxies of our business have created a dividend for more imaginative breeders. Because the discovery that Up to the Mark was an elite performer on grass means that we get a much milder fee than would be the case for a dirt horse so narrowly denied a fourth consecutive Grade I success. And yet the pedigree that made it perfectly logical to start him on dirt–first four dams are by Ghostzapper, Capote, Fappiano and Key To The Mint–could easily filter into his second career.

After all, Not This Time himself in this instance appears to have served as a conduit for the flexibility trademarked by Giant's Causeway. Maybe Up to the Mark can now emulate his grandsire by helping breeders to overcome their prejudices, especially in an era when the American turf program is growing far faster than the available pool of talent among Kentucky stallions.

There's room at the top, after all, after the loss of Kitten's Joy and English Channel. And those who are squeamish about chlorophyll will surely be comforted that Up to the Mark's grandam Capote Bell won elite dirt dashes in the GI Test and GII Prioress. If he can breed a few to start their careers like he did, impressive in a Saratoga dirt sprint, then perhaps they will also emulate the kind of money he made as a $450,000 Book 1 yearling.

Silver:
COUNTRY GRAMMER (Tonalist–Arabian Song, by Forestry)
Winstar $10,000

Country Grammer | Benoit

This horse was one of the great auction steals at just $110,000 at the 2021 Keeneland January Sale. It tells you a lot about our business that he had brought four times as much as a 2-year-old, at OBS April, yet had since won the GIII Peter Pan S.! He was chased home there by Caracaro (Uncle Mo) and Mystic Guide (Ghostzapper), respectively GI Travers runner-up and GII Jim Dandy winner on their next starts. Though it was a poignant dispersal that put him into the ring, only WinStar were wide awake. The rest of us must keep going to work!

Country Grammer now gets the chance to top up his earnings since–enormously inflated in the desert, but also very respectable in the best Californian company–at what could prove another bargain price.

It's unsurprising to be reminded that this tremendously game animal draws on two doses of Pleasant Colony, responsible for the dams of both sire Tonalist and damsire Forestry. Tonalist may be keeping his price down but remember that Country Grammer's sire is himself extremely well-bred, while the second dam is a half-sister to a brilliant dasher in Etoile Montante (Miswaki) and granddaughter of the Juddmonte foundation mare Nijinsky Star (Nijinsky). The continued efficacy of this branch has been confirmed by both his granddam (produced a very fast juvenile in Britain) and his own mother, whose daughter by Runhappy banked over half a million with multiple graded stakes placings.

On pedigree as well as performance, then, Country Grammer is absolutely entitled to sire an elite runner like himself, and you can't say that of many horses standing at this kind of money. Personally, I wouldn't labor the point about his earnings: nobody is going to deceive themselves that this is the third best American Thoroughbred of all time, and the real point of his Dubai win was that he had too much for the likes of Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow), Life Is Good (Into Mischief) and Midnight Bourbon (Tiznow). And pinhookers should note the progress he made, admittedly as a May 11 foal, from $60,000 September yearling to his bullet breeze in Ocala.

Gold:
LOGGINS (Ghostzapper–Beyond Blame, by Blame)
Hill 'n' Dale $7,500

Loggins | Coady Photography

Like everybody else, and far more than many, I'm just guessing with all these horses. But every now and then even I can strike lucky and that was certainly the case with Not This Time. I was in his corner from the moment he went to stud in 2017 at $15,000-a fee he has meanwhile increased tenfold-and I feel there are striking echoes about this fellow, who starts at half that price.

Both ran the subsequent champion juvenile to a neck on what unfortunately proved to be their final start, and in each case their connections were entitled to hope for revenge next time. At the Breeders' Cup Not This Time had to concede first run to Classic Empire, who exploited his cleaner trip but was all out to hold on. Loggins, in contrast, was exposed to a hot pace in the GI Breeders' Futurity at Keeneland, and yet rallied bravely as Forte picked up the pieces. Moreover, the winner jostled him towards the rail sufficiently for a rider objection, albeit one that was ultimately not sustained. Regardless it was a remarkable effort, against the GI Hopeful winner, from a horse that could not have learned too much when breaking his maiden by over eight lengths on debut.

He now enters competition with Mystic Guide for what remains a slightly alarming vacancy as a worthy heir to their sire, who's plainly in the evening of his career as he welcomes Loggins to the barn. It would be a shame if such a flamboyant talent failed to secure a male conduit for genes that have already served Justify and Up to the Mark so well, through their dams.

Loggins himself shared a damsire with Forte, in Blame. My feeling is that Blame's precocity in this capacity channels the quality both of his own maternal line, and that of his sire Arch. Now Loggins can combine that legacy with Ghostzapper's prowess as a broodmare sire, typical of the Deputy Minister sire-line. As such, any breeder who wouldn't mind retaining a filly would be well advised to consider Loggins.

He was a $460,000 Saratoga yearling, remember, as the first starter for a graded stakes winner out of a half-sister to two others. The next dam is a dual Grade II-placed Unbridled's Song half-sister not only to Street Boss but also to the dam of another elite sprinter in Jack Christopher (Munnings).

As the rest of this podium demonstrates, we'd appreciate rather more proof of soundness. But the bottom line is that a raw Loggins had shown himself to be nearly Forte's equal, forcing him seven lengths clear of smart horses like Red Route One (Gun Runner), Instant Coffee (Bolt d'Oro), Newgate (Into Mischief), Two Phil's (Hard Spun) and Funtastic Again (Funtastic). All served as complimentary proxies on the Derby trail after Loggins was derailed.

Forte obviously achieved a much deeper body of work, but that's why he's basically seven times the price. Loggins has gone to a farm that has excelled with these brief meteors and its owner must have been very keen, given that Spendthrift was in the ownership group that made a deal to send him here. In the current fee climate, he has been priced with unbelievable generosity. That will surely secure the kind of volume that can help Loggins make his second career far more sustainable than his first.

The Value Podium: New Sires

Gold: LOGGINS. $7,500 Hill 'n' Dale.

• Reminiscent of Not This Time.

Silver: COUNTRY GRAMMER. $10,000 WinStar.

• Modern career, old school merit.

Bronze: UP TO THE MARK. $25,000 Lane's End.

• Turf discount but potential for any surface.

Check out our breeders picks for their value sires of 2024.

The post Kentucky Value Sires for 2024, Part I: New Stallions appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

Jody Huckabay

The horses I have chosen are expensive, but I think they are good value.

GOLD: Elite Power (Curlin–Broadway's Alibi, by Vindication), Juddmonte Farms, $50,000. The first horse I like for his body of work, race record, and pedigree is Elite Power. To me, he's on top of the list, with everything being considered. I look at it as a pie, and how many pieces of that pie can I get. He's brings the most pieces. I love his speed. I love his longevity, his consistency. His pedigree is deep–a very deep family top and bottom–and the conformation was there as well.

SILVER: Gunite (Gun Runner–Simple Surprise, by Cowboy Cal), Ashford Stud, $40,000. Gunite would be number two for me, and it goes back to a lot of the same type of reasoning. He was a Grade I winner as a 2-year-old, a very attractive horse to me, the way he ties together, the way he moves, and his longevity. That's a big deal for me, and yes at $40,000 it's steep, but when you start looking at all the pieces he brings to the table, a lot of the things he moves for me.

BRONZE: Forte (Violence–Queen Caroline, by Blame), Spendthrift Farm, $50,000. I thought he was a really, really nice-looking horse, physically. A year from now, he's going to be a very imposing horse. He's still a little immature now but he will fill into an absolutely gorgeous horse. He was the 2-year-old champion. We raced Loggins, and the defeat we had at Keeneland to Forte was gut-wrenching. It was just unfortunate, because Loggins had some bad luck in spots, wasn't able to show his true colors, but he was a genuine racehorse. We're breeding several mares to him. He was as nice a yearling as we ever had. We have high hopes for him.

Tommy Wente

GOLD: Pappacap (Gun Runner–Pappascat, by Scat Daddy), Walmac Farm, $12,500. I think everybody is too high this year, and everybody is trying to get to the good horses and it's tough, but if anybody is good value, it's Pappacap at $12,500. He's a hard-knocking horse. He's very correct, a good size, and I think they could have stood him for a little more money, but they kept him at $12,500. For me, he's the best value there is among first-crop sires. He's a Gun Runner, who's very hot, and this horse could run. I booked three mares to him.

SILVER: Proxy (Tapit–Panty Raid, by Include), Darley, $25,000. He's by Tapit, he's well-bred, and he's at Darley, where they're not going to overbreed this horse. I like that. He might be $5,000 to $10,000 more than I wanted to spend, so at $25,000 he's a little high, but for his pedigree, and where he is standing, he's got a good shot at $25,000.

BRONZE: Two Phil's (Hard Spun–Mia Torri, by General Quarters), WinStar Farm, $12,500. I think Two Phil's is good value. He's a decent horse with good balance. He has a good front end, he's correct with a great body, has a great race record, and he's by Hard Spun. At $12,500, you've got a shot to make some money.

Honorable Mention: Taiba (Gun Runner–Needmore Flattery, by Flatter), Spendthrift Farm, $35,000. I thought he was a good value, and I'm glad I got one, but he booked up so fast I couldn't get more mares to him. He had 300 applications on the first day they announced he was going to go to stud. I think that makes him good value. He probably could have stood for $50,000 or $60,000 and still filled up. I don't know how many mares they took, but as soon as the word got out, it was crazy.

Sally Lockhart

GOLD: Elite Power! I bought four seasons for clients before the Breeders' Cup and am so excited. What a phenomenal racehorse and outstanding individual.

SILVER: Up to the Mark (Not This Time–Belle's Finale, by Ghostzapper), Lane's End Farm, $25,000. At $25,000 what's there not to like? Serious race record, son of Not This Time How can you go wrong?

BRONZE: Loggins (Ghostzapper–Beyond Blame, by Blame), Hill 'n' Dale Farm, $7,500. Great price for a great physical. I loved him when I saw him. Such a shame we didn't see his true potential on the track.

The post First-Crop Value Sires: The Breeders Speak appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

There is plenty to digest from three years' intake and of course prices can often drop after a stallion's first year at stud, so there could be some value to be found for breeders willing to roll the dice on a stallion about to embark on his third season. He will have first runners before the resultant offspring of this year's matings make it to a sale. As always, results on the track are everything, and we are very much in unproven territory here. 

As with the earlier parts of this series, the sires have been divided into fee brackets and though there is of course some discrepancy between the euro and the pound, we are treating them as equals here.

Stallions standing at £/€25,000 and above

At £80,000, Baaeed (GB) is the most expensive young sire to retire to stud within this timeframe and it would not have been a surprise if he had commenced covering at a six-figure fee. Instead he is starting at almost exactly the same level as his sire Sea The Stars (Ire) and the problem for Shadwell won't be filling his book, rather deciding which breeders they have to let down. 

Some will baulk at Baaeed's absence of two-year-old form but, at 135, he is the highest-rated son of a brilliant stallion with a wonderful pedigree behind him, as well as a race record that includes victory in six coveted Group 1 races in Britain and France. He'll be given a great chance in his new career and in a few years £80,000 may look very reasonable at this upper level of the stallion market.

Baaeed got the better of Palace Pier (GB) in the 2021 Champion S., but until then the latter had compiled a similar race record, albeit his included maiden and novice wins at two. This top-class miler had his fee trimmed to £50,000 from £55,000 for this year, after a who's who of international breeders lined up to use him in 2022, when he covered 154 mares, including the dams of Cracksman (GB) and Farhh (GB).

On a swelteringly hot June day in Chantilly, Sottsass (Fr) became the first Group 1-winning colt for his Siyouni (Fr) when landing the Prix du Jockey Club of 2019. One could sense the joy Peter Brant derived that day from winning a French Classic, and that was multiplied the following year when Sottsass claimed the Arc, too. He is of course a son of the Monceaux super mare Starlet's Sister (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and has been clipped to €25,000 from his €30,000 opening fee. His owner backed him strongly with his own mares and his first yearlings will take to the ring from August. A year behind him and bred on the same Siyouni-Galileo cross is the former champion juvenile St Mark's Basilica (Fr) who sailed through his 3-year-old seasons with a French Classic double followed up by victories in the Eclipse and Irish Champion S. A heftier price tag of €65,000 greeted his arrival at Coolmore, and his first foals will be arriving this spring, while his half-brother Magna Grecia (Ire) (Invincible Spirit {Ire}) will be represented by his first runners. A big year for the family.

One name that we can expect to make a big splash at the yearling sales this year is the 2020 Horse of the Year Ghaiyyath (Ire). The first foals of the son of Dubawi (Ire) and Classic heroine Nightime (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) returned a six-figure average just above 100,000gns, with a 375,000gns top lot. He is competitively priced at €25,000 and he has covered some smart mares, including G1 Fillies' Mile winner Lyric Of Light (GB) (Street Cry {Ire}), G2 Rockfel S. winner and 1,000 Guineas runner-up Lucida (Ire) (Shamardal), and dual Group 3 winner Tickled Pink (Ire) (Invincible Spirit {Ire}), who is also the dam of G1 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Victoria Road (Ire) (Saxon Warrior {Jpn}).

Pinatubo (Ire) carried all before him in his unbeaten juvenile season, ending 2019 as the champion in Europe. It is easy to imagine that his offspring could show similar precocity, thus making it a decent bet that his first yearlings will sell well this year. For these reasons, along with strong support from breeders, he has remained at €35,000 since his retirement to stud. His sire Shamardal had started out at €40,000 and dropped in years four and five to half that amount. We all know what happened after that: his fee climbed steadily, along with his reputation for excellence. 

Persian King (Ire) was an early star and a first Classic winner for his sire Kingman (GB). A Group 3-winning juvenile, beating Magna Grecia (Ire) in the Autumn S. at Newmarket, he took the Poule d'Essai des Poulains and then added a further two Group 1 wins to his credit at four in the Prix d'Isaphan and Prix du Moulin. A first try at a mile and a half on his swansong saw him finish third behind Sottsass in the Arc. He entered stud at a sold €30,000 and has been trimmed slightly in this, his third year, to €25,000.

Last season's champion juvenile Blackbeard (Ire) will remain a brilliant 2-year-old in our memories as he has been retired to stud off his dual Group 1 strikes in the Prix Morny and Middle Park S. From his eight starts, he won six, as early as the beginning of April and including the G3 Marble Hill and G2 Prix Robert Papin. 

At a time when many breeders will struggle to get near his sire No Nay Never, Blackbeard looks an appealing alternative at €25,000 and it's unlikely that he will lack support. 

Stallions standing at £/€15,000 to £/€24,999

Godolphin had an embarrassment of Shamardal riches in 2019 with Pinatubo stealing the show but Earthlight (Ire) more than holding his own when, just like Blackbeard three years later, he won the G1 Prix Morny and G1 Middle Park. Earthlight's foals sold well last year and, now trimmed from an opening fee of €20,000 to €15,000, he could well be good value at this level. Victor Ludorum (GB), who completed Godolphin's hat-track of homebred Group 1-winning sons of Shamardal that year, stayed in training through his 4-year-old season after winning the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere and Poule d'Essai des Poulains in his first two years in training. His final win was in the G3 Prix Messidor, and he too is at €15,000 at Haras du Logis.

Hello Youmzain (Fr) has Shamardal on his dam's side and is a rare son of Kodiac (GB) in France. He's a durable one, too. In three seasons to race, he was a Group 2-winning juvenile before landing the G1 Sprint Cup at three and the G1 Diamond Jubilee at four. Starting out at €25,000, he's now at €22,500 in his third season.

At the same stage in their stud careers are two Group 1-winning milers: Kameko and Mohaather (GB). The former, by Kitten's Joy and a top-level winner at two and three, has had a £10,000 reduction from his opening fee and is now at £15,000, while Mohaather, a sleek son of Showcasing (GB), has also been at that fee for two years, having started at £20,000.

Like the aforementioned Victor Ludorum, Lucky Vega (Ire) also represents the Shamardal line, has his first foals arriving, and is also pitched in at €15,000. He has received significant backing by his owner Yulong Investments, and is one of a number of young sons of Lope De Vega (Ire) at stud. It is doubtless hoped by his connections that he will pick up the baton for this line which is increasingly flourishing in Europe.

Similar comments can be applied to Space Blues (Ire) and the Dubawi sire-line. The hardy little chestnut really hit his stride as an older horse after being Group 1-placed and a listed winner at three. His top-level wins came in the Prix Maurice de Gheest (beating Hello Youmzain) at four, before he signed off at five with an international G1 double in the Prix de la Foret and Breeders' Cup Mile. He has been competitively priced at €16,000 this season.

The G1 July Cup winner Starman (GB) was one of the busiest Flat stallions of 2022, with David Ward's statuesque homebred given a rousing reception at Tally-Ho Stud when covering 254 mares at a fee of €17,000. That has been trimmed his season to €15,000.

Entering stud this season in this bracket are the Group 1 winners State Of Rest (Ire) at €25,000, and Mishriff (Ire) and Torquator Tasso (Ger) at €20,000. Perfect Power (Ire) begins at a fee of £15,000 in Newmarket, while in Ireland Bayside Boy (Ire), Minzaal (Ire) and Naval Crown (Ire) are all starting off at €15,000.

Stallions standing at £/€7,500 to £/€14,999

In France, where Wootton Bassett (GB) is almost certainly missed, his fast son Wooded (Fr) was added to the ranks at Haras de Bouquetot in 2021 after winning the G1 Prix de l'Abbaye. Starting off at €15,000, his first yearlings are on the horizon and his fee has been snipped to €12,000.

Wooded went head-to-head in Normandy with Golden Horde (Ire), another Group 1-winning sprinter who joined the Sumbe team and will also have his first yearlings for sale this year. His opening mark of €10,000 has been reduced to €8,000.

Circus Maximus (Ire) has tended to sail a little under the radar, but it should not be forgotten that he is a treble Group 1-winning miler by Galileo (Ire) out of a classy mare in the Group 2 winner Duntle (Ire) (Danehill Dancer {Ire}). His fee has been halved from his first year to €10,000 in his third year, and he has some potentially smart offspring to represent him, including Proxima Centauri (Ire), a filly out of his breeder's four-time Group 1 winner Alpha Centauri (Ire) (Mastercraftsman {Ire}) and a colt out of the smart racemare Banimpire (Ire) (Holy Roman Emperor {Ire})

Another well-bred son of Galileo, Japan (GB), joined the German stallion division at Gestut Etzean in 2022 and has remained at €11,000 for his first two seasons. The National Stud's Lope Y Fernandez (Ire) is another with first foals arriving and his fee has also been maintained at £8,500, while the G1 Middle Park S. winner Supremacy (Ire), one of a number of young sons of Mehmas (Ire) to retire to stud in the last two years, has been trimmed from €12,500 to €10,000 at Yeomanstown Stud. A year behind him is another Mehmas horse, Persian Force (Ire), who starts out at Tally-Ho Stud, where he was conceived, at €10,000.

The Chehboub family's Haras de Beaumont sets out its stall as one of the newest stallion operations in France by standing their own Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere and Champion S. winner Sealiway (Fr) at an opening fee of €12,000.

If you set a stallion's fee against the number of miles covered in their careers then Stradivarius (Ire) would certainly represent value as he raced over almost 65 miles during his 35 races, 20 of which he won, including 18 group races. In fact, any way you look at it, you get plenty of bang for your buck (£10,000, to be precise) when booking a mare to the charismatic stayer, for his noted soundness is exemplified by his elastic movement which has turned many heads since he joined the stallion yard at the National Stud. Throw in the Stradivarius breeder bonus offered by his owner Bjorn Nielsen, which rewards the breeders of his first ten 2-year-old winners with £25,000 each, and first-crop group winners with £100,000 for Group 2 or 3 races and £250,000 for a Group 1 victory, then he is certainly worthy of serious consideration.

Stallions standing at less than £/€7,500

Farhh (GB) may have covered only limited books since retiring to stud in 2014 but he now has four sons at stud. Two of those, Far Above (Ire) and King Of Change (GB), stand alongside each other at Starfield Stud and have their first yearlings on offer later this year. Yes, it's a chancey time to use any third-year stallion, but at €5,000 and €6,000 respectively, they look well-priced, and the Group 1-winning miler King Of Change in particular came in for some compliments from shrewd operators when his first foals were in the sales rings last November.

We may have trouble saying his name, but Sergei Prokofiev did not go unnoticed when his first foals hit the sales last year either, and the son of Scat Daddy is another ensuring that the Whitsbury Manor Stud stallion barn remains plenty busy over the coming months. At £6,000 he is competitively priced, and the same can be said for River Boyne (Ire), Tara Stud's Grade 1-winning son of Dandy Man (Ire), who has remained at €5,000, the same fee set this year for Shaman (Ire), the Wertheimer-bred son of Shamardal who is at Yeomanstown Stud.

One of the most interesting horses in this fee bracket is Sands Of Mali (Fr), winner of the Gimcrack at two, followed by the G1 QIPCO British Champions Sprint at three among his four group victories. He's by a stallion that has some people scratching their heads, the dual Group 3 winner Panis, himself a son of the influential Miswaki. At €5,000, Sands Of Mali is an easy horse to breed to, but not just because of his largely outcross pedigree: he was also talented and is good-looking to boot. He has recently been joined at Ballyhane Stud by Space Traveller (GB), a son of Bated Breath (GB) who raced until he was six, having won the G2 Clipper Logistics Boomerang S. and G3 Jersey S. at three. His final start came last season when denied by a head to finish second in the GI Frank E Kilroe Mile at Santa Anita, and he starts his new career at a fee of €6,500.

Also at €5,000 at Castlefield Stud in Ireland is Alkumait (GB). We can be certain that his half-brother Chaldean (GB) (Frankel {GB}) will end up at stud eventually, but in the meantime this Group 2 winner has stolen a march and joins an increasing throng of sons of the popular Showcasing (GB) now at stud.

No Nay Never is another stallion with increasing representation among the stallion ranks and his young sons include Arizona (Ire), who is at Castleyhde Stud and the Molecomb S. winner Armor (GB), a recruit last year to Haras de Bouquetot. Both stand at €5,000, while Armor has been joined at Bouquetot by the G1 National S. winner Thunder Moon (Ire), who stands for €6,000.

A'Ali (Ire), a son of the late Society Rock who notched up four Group 2 wins during his career with Simon Crisford, joined the throng at Newsells Park Stud last season and his fee has been reduced from an opening mark of £7,500 to £5,000 this year, making him another to be a potentially value option for breeders. 

Tally-Ho Stud is represented as the breeder of a growing number of stallions at stud, including A'Ali and also Overbury Stud's new recruit Caturra (Ire). The Flying Childers winner is the first son of Mehmas to stand in the UK, and he has joined another Tally-Ho-bred, Ardad (Ire), at the Gloucestershire farm, where he will start off at £6,500.

The latest son of Wootton Basssett to retire to stud in France is last season's Poule d'Essai des Poulains runner-up Texas (Fr), who now stands at Haras de Hoguenet for €3,800.

Big Shuffle's son Areion (Ger) made a pronounced mark on the German breeding scene over many years, and died last year at the age of 27. He has been succeeded in that country by the Group 1 winner Alson (Ger), who retired to Gestut Fahrhof last year and stands at €6,000, while Rubaiyat (Fr), a five-time group winner in Germany and Italy, is his latest son to take up stallion duties, and he is at Gestut Ohlerweiherhof, where he commands a fee of €4,500.

Value podium:
Instead of selecting a gold, silver and bronze medallist, as is the norm for this feature, I am opting instead for three stallions across the distance range whom I believe represent value at this early stage of their careers. There are no prizes for guessing that Stradivarius is one, and he is joined by the miler Mohaather and the sprinter Sands Of Mali.

The post Value Sires Part V: Everything to Prove appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post