BOBBY FRANKEL : ONE OF THE ALL-TIME GREATS

Bobby Frankel and Ginger Punch
(Photo : The Florida Horse/Slam)

OF BOBBY FRANKEL, HAPPY AND GINGER PUNCH

Few people in South Africa will know the late Bobby Frankel, but Americans will tell you, he was one of the all-time greats, and a rare inductee to their Hall of Fame, as a fabled trainer.

He passed away recently, and Mike Rogers (whom we deal with for Champion U.S. Breeders, Adena Springs and their founder, Frank Stronach) posted this piece on a man who clearly understood his priorities.

Leading up to the 2007 Breeders’ Cup at Monmouth Park, all of us in the Stronach Stable camp were excited at the prospect of Ginger Punch’s participation in the Ladies’ Classic. Five days out, I received a call from Bobby Frankel. In typical Bobby fashion, there was minimal small talk before he cut to the chase. He informed me that he would be unable to attend the Breeders’ Cup, going into detail regarding his dog Happy’s unfortunate medical condition and his decision to remain in California with her. My initial reaction was a simple “really?” Bobby asked me to respectfully relay the information to Mr. and Mrs. Stronach. I assured him that I would pass along the circumstances surrounding his decision to Frank and Frieda.

I immediately called Frank and relayed Bobby’s message. Frank’s response was identical to my own: “really?” Frank then requested that I get Bobby on the line so he could speak to him directly. I was apprehensive - my gut reaction was that the conversation would not go over very well with either of them.

I reached Bobby and told him that I had Frank on the line. It was easy to sense Bobby’s own apprehension with his simple, “Hi, Frank.” Following a pregnant pause, Frank said in the most caring voice, “Bobby, how’s your dog?” I gave a strong sigh of relief, and I’m certain Bobby did as well. Bobby went on to explain that his dog was not doing very well, and he was uncomfortable leaving her in California. After the two of them talked about Happy, Frank asked Bobby how Ginger Punch was doing. Bobby replied that she was ready to run the race of her life, and there was nothing more he could do for her. Frank finished the call, saying, AOK Bobby, you look after Happy and we’ll look after Ginger.”

I will always remember the feeling I had when I hung up after listening to two immensely successful, yet very misunderstood men. They each managed to show great respect for what was important to the other man.

Ginger Punch went on to run exactly as Bobby predicted. Her Breeders’ Cup victory was her crowning achievement and ultimately led to a coveted Eclipse Award. Happy lived a little while longer with Bobby close to her side, but ultimately succumbed to her illness. Bobby eventually acquired two new dogs. His choice of names was a very fitting tribute to one of the many champions that he trained during his remarkable Hall of Fame career: Ginger and Punch.

We will all miss him.

Mike Rogers

ADENA SPRINGS SIRE EL PRADO DIES AT AGE 20

El Prado
Adena Springs

(Please click photo to enlarge…)

We were greeted this week with the news that America’s Champion Breeder and Summerhill client, Adena Springs, had sadly lost their resident and leading sire, El Prado, indeed one of the world’s elite.

The Thoroughbred Daily News reported yesterday that El Prado (Ire) (Sadler’s Wells - Lady Capulet, by Sir Ivor) died of a heart attack soon after being turned out into his paddock Monday morning. Still active at 20, the stallion stood for $75,000 in 2009. Although well accomplished on the racetrack, El Prado scaled new heights at stud, siring eight Grade I/Group 1 and 30 graded stakes winners, and a total of 74 horses who triumphed at the stakes level. The stallion’s leading earner is multiple Grade I winner Medaglia d’Oro.

On the track, the Darley stallion won the 2002 GI Travers Stakes, 2003 GI Whitney Handicap and 2004 GI Donn Handicap, and was runner-up in both the 2002 and 2003 GI Breeders’ Cup Classics, as well as the 2004 G1 Dubai World Cup. Medaglia d’Oro’s racing accomplishments helped El Prado earn leading sire honors in 2002, and saw the grey’s stud fee increase to $75,000 in 2003. Medaglia d’Oro quickly asserted himself as a leading sire in his own right with the likes of GI Preakness Stakes winner Rachel Alexandra in his first crop to race.

El Prado is also the sire of 2004 Champion Turf Horse Kitten’s Joy, a top Freshman sire; Puerto Rican Champion Mi Pradera; and Grade I winners Artie Schiller, Borrego, Asi Siempre and Spanish Moon. As a broodmare sire, he is represented by Grade I winners Bit of Whimsy (Distorted Humor) and Laragh (Tapit).

In the sales ring, El Prado was represented by his first seven-figure sales horse when This is That brought $1 million as a juvenile at the 2003 BESMAR Sale. In 2007, Asi Siempre sold for $3 million as a broodmare prospect at FTKNOV, and the following year, Flagship sold for $1 million at the 2008 Keeneland September Yearling Sale. Earlier this season, a juvenile colt by the stallion topped the OBS March Sale with a $450,000 final bid.

Group 1 winner El Prado was bred in Ireland by Lyonstown Stud and was campaigned by Robert Sangster and legendary trainer Vincent O’Brien. Out of 1977 Irish 1000 Guineas winner Lady Capulet, the gray is a half brother to 1987 Irish champion three-year-old Entitled (Ire) (Mill Reef). As a two-year-old, El Prado won four of six starts, including the G1 National Stakes, G2 Beresford Stakes and G3 Railway Stakes, and was named Ireland’s champion juvenile of 1991. 

Off the board in three starts in 1992, El Prado was retired to Brereton Jones’s Airdrie Stud in Midway, Kentucky in 1993, standing for the partnership of Sangster, O’Brien, Coolmore and Frank Stronach. Initially offered at a fee of $7,500, he ranked eighth on the 1996 freshman sire list with progeny earnings of $398,925. In 1998, after renovations on the farm were completed, the stallion moved to Stronach’s Adena Springs.

MEDAGLIA D’ORO : A windfall for Sheikh Mohammed

Medaglia D’Oro
(Photo : Thoroughbred Times)

There’s been plenty of news of late of new property acquisitions by Dubai’s Ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, and then on Friday we were greeted by the announcement that he had purchased the “hottest” young stallion in the United States, Medaglia D’Oro. Those that attended the 2007 version of the Dubai World Cup will recall Medaglia D’Oro’s stirring battle in the closing stages of the world’s richest race when he succumbed, only just, to the persistent urgings of Pleasantly Perfect, and we can attest, following a recent visit there, to the fact that Medaglia D’Oro has let down into one of the most spectacular specimens of a young stallion imaginable.

Besides having spawned the highest rated filly (of any age) in the world right now in the form of Rachel Alexandra, (20 ¼ winner of the Kentucky Oaks (Gr.1) just over a month ago, and vanquisher of the colts in the second leg of the American Triple Crown, the Preakness Stakes (Gr.1), Medaglia D’Oro rewarded Sheikh Mohammed’s boldness within a day, with yet another Grade One winner from his first crop in the shape of Gabby’s Golden Gal, who walked off with the laurels in the Acorn Stakes (Gr.1) at the Belmont meeting in New York.

Medaglia D’ Oro’s sire, El Prado, is something of an aberration as a stallion. A son of the thirteen time European Champion, Sadler’s Wells, he raced exclusively in Ireland on turf, and was a Grade One winner of the National Stakes as a two-year-old before his acquisition by Frank Stronach’s Adena Springs (champion breeders of America and clients of Summerhill) where he was asked to embark on a career as a proven grass horse in a “dirty”country. El Prado warmed to his new career with relish, twice topping the American sires log, and it now looks as if he might make a third career for himself as a sire of sires. Everything about him suggested that success on the dirt tracks of the United States was an unlikely outcome to his career, yet it goes to show, there is little we can do to predict the future of stallions, besides educated guessing.

ADENA SPRINGS named US Champion Breeder

Adena Springs has topped the list of leading individual breeders in North America in 2008, for the sixth consecutive year.

Congratulations must go to Frank and Andy Stronach and the Champion Adena Springs Team.

The Thoroughbred Daily News reports that according to figures released by The Jockey Club Information Systems, Inc. on Tuesday, Adena Springs bred the winners of 603 races from 3,671 starts. Stonerside Stable, which bred the winners of 98 races from 518 starts for earnings of $7,433,027 to is second on the list. Adena Springs also heads the breeders’ list which includes partnership, with Stonerside second on that list as well. Completing the list of top 10 individual breeders (with earnings):

Eugene Melnyk ($6,410,230);
Brereton C Jones ($6,339,254);
WinStar Farm LLC ($5,460,005);

Juddmonte Farms Inc. ($4,924,494);
Sherman Family Thoroughbreds LLC ($4,839,702);
Sez Who Thoroughbreds ($4,780,068);
Padua Stables ($4,773,351); and

Everst Stables Inc. ($3,966,631).

Rounding out the list of top 10 breeders which includes partnerships are:

W. S. Farish, Brereton Jones, Eugene Melnyk, WinStar Farm, Sherman Family Thoroughbreds, Sez Who Thoroughbreds, Juddmonte Farms and Padua Stables.

PS. You may recall that Andy Stronach, on the back of his attending the Summerhill Stallion Day last year, bought four mares at the Sibaya Broodmare Sale, with a view to supporting the DANEHILL stallions standing at Summerhill.

TWO-YEAR-OLD SALES : Rob Whiteley and Nick de Meric give their views

With our man John Motaung, riding his socks off at the Ready to Run sales in the USA at present, articles on these programmes are especially relevant right now. TDN asks leading personalities about their views :

Liberation Farm Owner Rob Whiteley:

Rob Whiteley (thoroughbred charities) My hat is off to the pinhookers and two-year-old sale consignors. They do a damn good job for the most part, while lodged between a rock and a hard place. Quite a few pinhookers possess some of the keenest eyes in the business, and they show tremendous horsemanship in getting a number of their hand-picked babies to the sales in one piece. Yet, the current obsession with speed makes their job extremely difficult and defies common sense.

Asking a young, developing horse for a maximum burst of speed on a given day in February or March (and putting him or her through such a demanding preparation) doesn’t prove much, and unnecessarily risks ruining the horse. I believe we need to turn back the clock to the days when we let the babies show themselves under a strong gallop. (I think Frank Stronach has this one right when he conducts his entire private sale under something close to a two minute lick.)

I think also that we are selling trainers and other real horsemen short when we suggest that they can only tell a good horse by the time it takes them to go an eighth or a quarter. This game is all about having an eye to see athletic, fluid motion, and about inferring quality and competitiveness in an untried horse. It is not about cheap speed. Real pros used to have no trouble picking out the stars when they were galloped, so where did we blow the turn? Do we really think that Richard Mandella or Mike Ryan needs to watch a horse go in 10 flat to see that it’s a promising race horse? What time did Afleet Alex or Monarchos or Stevie Wonderboy work in when they were two-year-old sales horses? Go look it up.

Making astute selections involves discerning how a horse moves motion analysis, and he did quite well using horses at a gallop. Even the contemporary stride analysis folks at DataTrack, Equix, or EQB don’t require intense speed, because you can’t hide inefficiencies of movement. Furthermore, individual stride analysis can still be performed meaningfully with horses galloping strongly, because an individual sale horse’s score or profile is relative to all of the other horses in that sales group.

In short, and for many reasons, speed is our enemy. Training for intense speed causes too much attrition. It’s hard on pin-hookers who bravely make the investment, and it’s obviously hard on the immature horses.

At the end of the day, are we really happy selling only 35 percent of the two-year-olds catalogued for a sale? So, what will fix this dismal reality? It’s time the consignors, buyers, and sales companies sat down together and figured it out.

Juvenile Consignor Nick de Meric:

Nick De Meric (demeric) I think that history proves annually how effective our method of marketing two-year-olds is: the results speak for themselves. Year in, year out, graduates of two-year old sales outperform industry percentages, breed statistics and their own pedigrees. They consistently perform at the highest levels of competition. However, the steady progression towards rewarding extreme workouts in breeze shows has resulted in a potentially unhealthy preoccupation with sprint speed.

It is a truism to say that good horses tend to work faster than mediocre ones and by definition have naturally higher cruising speeds. Nevertheless, it is also true that a horse that can work : 11 flat, a distinctly moderate time in today’s breeze shows, six times in a row has just set a new world record for three-quarters of a mile. It does not follow that every horse capable of a superfast workout for an eighth of a mile will be stakes quality if he remains sound, just as not every horse whose top speed is significantly slower than the fastest works has no chance of being better than an average performer, though plenty are, in both categories. For me, it is all about how they do it.

This trend has resulted in preparation methods that tend to favor tremendous speed over short distances. This is not always in the best interests of the animal’s long term athletic future. Preparation for the track tends to place less emphasis on this kind of speed, if the truth be told.

In recognition of this, sale companies have sought to mitigate its effects, while still providing a suitable stage upon which two year olds can perform for buyers’ evaluation. Fasig-Tipton and Keeneland changing their format to a single breeze show and OBS’s significant investment in the synthetic Safetrack all help to reduce the risk of injury and promote a sounder product. As sellers, we should applaud these initiatives and do our part to present our customers with horses that are not overtrained when they are purchased and which continue to perform well at the track, as they have for decades.

Regarding uniformity of medication rules, embracing an intelligently conceived industry standard for the sale of two-year-olds would doubtless be a positive step, but until racing jurisdictions and state laws offer the same parity, it is difficult to envisage this becoming a reality.

From its very inception, the Thoroughbred breed has been developed on an annual cycle, including mating, foaling, yearling and sales and the racing of two-year olds as early as March and April. Spring to early summer, therefore, is the only viable time to build any excitement for marketing them to buyers who hope to participate in juvenile races.

Extract from Thoroughbred Daily News