THE TYRANNY OF DISTANCE

Irish trainer Dermot Weld with 1993 Melbourne Cup winner, Vintage Crop
(Photo : Irish National Stud)

“One aspect of Japanese racing which I admire
is the way it still encompasses top-class races for stayers.”
Andrew Caulfield

If there’s one horror breeders around the world seem to have, it’s breeding to stallions which have displayed large reserves of stamina. On Tuesday, we penned a piece on the mind-shift adopted by British breeders following the conquests of the likes of Sir Ivor and Nijinsky in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and their abandonment of the use of stallions which had proven themselves over the longer trips. The emphasis turned to speed, preferably horses that had proven themselves at a mile or less. We speak of a universal horror, but at least the Japanese have overcome any concerns in this respect, and they have benefitted substantially by it.

In the immediate aftermath of our article, the pedigree guru, Andrew Caulfied, produced a commentary on Sunday’s winner of the Japan Cup (Gr.1) (Gentildonna), and in the course of it, he commented on this very topic.

“One aspect of Japanese racing which I admire is the way it still encompasses top-class races for stayers. The JRA stage the G2 Sports Nippon Sho Stayers Stakes over 2 1/4 miles, the G3 Diamond Stakes over 2 1/8 miles and the G2 Hanshin Daishoten over 1 7/8 miles, but more importantly it also still runs the spring edition of the G1 Tenno Sho over two miles and the last leg of the Triple Crown, the G1 Kikuka Sho, over 1 7/8 miles. Unlike in Europe, distinguished participation in these races doesn’t confer an automatic ticket to obscurity after retirement. Deep Impact won the Kikuka Sho to become only the sixth horse to win the Japanese Triple Crown. Then, as a 4-year-old, he began his campaign with clear-cut victories in the Hanshin Daishoten and the Tenno Sho (2 miles), so he clearly stayed very well. To be flippant, it appears that Deep Impact’s stamina hasn’t had a negative effect on his value. He was syndicated for Yen 5.1 billion, which at the time equated to around $42.7 million! He went on to run two more races after his syndication, ending his career with decisive wins in the Japan Cup and Arima Kinen, both at around a mile and a half. He has rewarded investors with 22 graded/group winners in his first two crops, which equates to more than 7% graded winners to foals in those two crops. These 22 have 19 different broodmare sires, with the doubly represented Caerleon and Bertolini each owing his double success to a single broodmare.”

Caulfield’s comments on stamina remind us of a story on The Melbourne Cup, which appeared in these columns a few seasons back: “The Melbourne Cup is an Australian institution dating to 1860 (more than thirty years before Durban staged its first Durban July), and for the first 150 years almost, Australians counted the Cup as their own, at least to the degree that they could ever count New Zealanders as family. The Aussies can be quite parochial about these things, so anything they’d have to share with their trans-Tasman neighbours could only occur in harmony if the Kiwis could take it home with a measure of grace. The stature of this race, in the end a handicap contest between a bunch of old stayers in a speed-crazy country, has grown to such a degree that the first Tuesday in November is celebrated as a public holiday in the state of Victoria, and the race has been known not only to “stop the nation”, but also to suspend the Federal parliament. The coziness which had the Cup in the clutches of Australasian horsemen for almost a century and a half, was rocked in recent years by the outreach programme embraced by the Victoria Racing Club (VRC), which subsidised flights, entry fees and accommodation for foreign raiders. In the broader scenario though, nobody foresaw a change in the status quo, so nobody worried.

Along came the Irish-trained Vintage Crop, and along came the end of innocence. Australia’s oldest sporting tradition had finally been opened up to the outside world, and the outside world had won. Some believed this could only enrich the race and the folklore that goes with it. But others were uneasy. Foreigners had plundered their best race: they might grab the money again next year. Outsiders had made their racing heroes look ordinary. If they had not come along, Australians could’ve gone on telling themselves they had the best horses and best jockeys in the world.

The controversy still simmers: it gives a fresh dimension to Geoffrey Blainey’s theory about the tyranny of distance. There is a charm in distance. It allows you to hang onto your myths. When the VRC first invited Irish and English horses to run in the Cup, most locals thought it a fine idea. It was assumed these beasts would have the good grace to lose, and that their connections would fall about saying what super horses the Australians had, and what an honour it was to spend sixty grand on airfares and to be allowed to listen to the Governor General, reading from his prepared notes with all the spontaneity of a dissident at one of Stalin’s show trials.

The trouble was, the Irish trainer Dermot Weld, did a wondrous thing. He brought Vintage Crop 17,000 kms on a 38-hour plane trip. He turned him out beautifully. He had him as fit as a horse could be, and he didn’t just win the Cup: he romped away with it, and set a weight-carrying record for a seven-year-old. Locals said it couldn’t be done, and this infiltrator had done it. The Melbourne Cup, like no other race in the world, is part of a National culture. In less than three-and-a-half minutes, everything had changed, perhaps forever. Now the other hemisphere owned a piece of the race. The Cup would become The Staying Championship of the World. This year Irish accents, next year American accents. Australians’ might have trouble winning their own race. What had they started?”

THE RISING SUN

Manhattan Cafe (JPN)… a good case in point.
(Image : Oumanoshasin/Impereal)

JAPAN CUP (G1)
Tokyo, Turf, 2400m
25 November 2012

Mick Goss
Summerhill Stud CEOIf you think that the frequency with which we revisit the achievements of the Sunday Silence-line reflects an obsession, you’re right. But the truth is, it’s because members of the tribe keep thrusting themselves into the international limelight, and it was no different in Asia’s richest horserace, the $5million Japan Cup (Gr.1) on Sunday. Four of the first five home were grandsons of the great stallion, and toiling in their wake was last month’s Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (Gr.1) heroine, Solemia, as well as the second and third in the recent Melbourne Cup (Gr.1).

The emergence of Japanese racing in recent decades owes just about everything to Sunday Silence, as well as to the Yoshida family who stood him at their Shadai Stallion Corporation headquarters, and whose Sunday Racing syndicate owned the first three past the post on the weekend. The winner by just a nose, was the Fillies’ Triple Crown ace, Gentildonna (by the all-conquering Deep Impact), ensuring a second consecutive defeat for the Japanese star, Orfevre, who had “winner” written all over him in the Arc when he was nabbed on the post by Solemia. The extent to which the “Arc” result distorted their merits, was reflected in Sunday’s outcome, when Orfevre was decidedly Solemia’s superior. Himself a Triple Crown hero a year before Gentildonna annexed the fillies’ version, Orfevre looks every inch the world class racehorse, and will doubtless find his way to the Shadai Stallion Station when his time comes.

The signs of Japan’s growing status as a source of genuine international racehorses have been evident for decades now, and it’s an arguable proposition that they are today, pound-for-pound, the bastion of the finest mile and a half performers in the world. I spoke personally with Teruya Yoshida on an aircraft one day between Hyderabad and Mumbai, about the policy behind their acquisition of the best European Derby and “Arc” winners. He explained that it was a formula that had served Europe and Britian so well for centuries, yet they’d reached a stage where they were discarding them in favour of the speedier American types like Sir Ivor and Nijinsky. This presented Japan with an outstanding opportunity to poach the best European horses at those distances for their own purposes, and to rewrite the Japanese racing programme to suit their progeny. These days, the Japanese revere their leading performers at those trips, and they are never short of a willingness to give their St Leger winners (at a mile and three quarters) and even further, a shot at stud. A good case in point is the excellent sire Manhattan Café (by Sunday Silence no less), who ranks perennially in their top five stallions. The Japanese have always been good at spotting a gap, and in this one, they’ve outplayed the world. They gave us Toyota, remember.

JAPAN CUP : A SUNDAY UPSET, A SUNDAY SWEEP

Click above to watch Gentildonna and Orfevre fighting out the Japan Cup
(Image : Paulick Report - Footage : Toshio Nagata)

JAPAN CUP (G1)
Tokyo, Turf, 2400m
25 November 2012

Sunday Racing’s 2011 Japanese Triple Crown winner Orfevre (Jpn) (Stay Gold) suffered a heart-breaking loss in the G1 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at the hands of a determined filly early last month. Yesterday, he again fell prey to another gutsy lass in the form of Japan’s 2012 Filly Triple Crown heroine Gentildonna (Jpn) (Deep Impact) - also owned by Sunday Racing - in one of their home country’s premier events, the G1 Japan Cup at Tokyo.

A year after winning Japan’s Triple Crown with Orfevre, Sunday Racing was poised to sweep the filly version of the series after Gentildonna won the 1600-meter G1 Oka Sho (Japan 1000 Guineas) at Hanshin in April and the 2400-meter G1 Yushun Himba (Japanese Oaks) at Tokyo in May. The Northern Racing-bred filly was rested over the summer, and after prepping with a victory in the 1800-meter G2 Kansai Tele Corp Sho Rose Stakes at Hanshin September 16, completed the Triple Crown with a nose tally over longtime rival Verxina (Jpn) (Deep Impact) in the 2000-meter G1 Shuka Sho at Kyoto October 14.

Making her first start since and sent off the 5-1 third choice, Gentildonna was away alertly from post 15 and raced up to a prominent early position. She secured an ideal tracking position in third as Beat Black (Jpn) (Miscast) took up the running in earnest. Arc heroine Solemia, at 21-1, raced along in fourth, with the even-money Orfevre back another four or five lengths while in the clear on the outside. Beat Black began to extend his advantage on the backstretch, and led by as much as 10 lengths heading into the far turn. He still had a four-length cushion with 400 meters remaining, but the field, fanned out six abreast, was closing in fast. Gentiledonna and Orfevre, swarming past on either side of a tiring rival, soon reeled in Beat Black, with the former pushing out Orfevre a bit to avoid running up on heels of the sputtering pacesetter. From there, she gamely asserted to get her nose down as they flashed under the wire.

The win, the first by a sophomore filly in the Cup, came after a lengthy stewards inquiry, as Gentildonna had muscled her way out in the stretch and bumped with Orfevre before finishing a nose in front on the line. Sunday Racing also campaigns the third-placed finisher Rulership (Jpn) (King Kamehameha), while the operation’s fourth Cup horse, Fenomeno (Jpn) (Stay Gold), ran fifth.

Stewards let the result stand, but announced that winning jockey Yasunari Iwata, collecting his third Cup victory, would serve a two-day suspension for his ride on Gentildonna. Iwata, hardly in a down mood afterward, accepted some blame and talked about how the race unfolded. “I had studied the track condition and thought that the inside would be a good choice,” he explained. “Although the draw was way out, I was able to position nicely, and we had a perfect trip up to the stretch, I am afraid the blame is on me for causing some trouble to Orfevre. But the filly is nonetheless a great filly for out-dueling a monster like Orfevre. I was conscious of facing a very tough field compared to her past races, but decided to just concentrate on bringing out her best performance, which she did. I would certainly love to accompany her in her overseas endeavor for the coming 4-year-old season, and I am confident that she has the potential to win against the best. But she is a very delicate filly, and her chance to mature both physically and mentally comes first. I am just looking forward to feel her progress and grow up in her future races.”

“Although the Japan Cup was a big challenge for a 3-year-old filly, I was confident that she was up to the competition and she proved that today,” said winning trainer Sei Ishizaka. “She had maintained her form and I knew, being a fighter in a duel, that she would pull through and claim her victory.” He went on to confirm that there is a lot of racing left in Gentildonna. “I am thinking long term - not just next year, but even the year after that,” he said. “She still has room for improvement, and I am confident that she will have a bright future ahead. After her battle against tough competition in the Japan Cup, she will be turned out until her 4-year-old season, during which, depending on her condition, I will go on with my plan for overseas challenges, which had been my consideration ever since Gentildonna won the third leg of the Fillies Triple Crown, perhaps in Dubai, France or the U.S.”

Extract from Thoroughbred Daily News

ALI VS FRAZIER : KATSUMI VS TERUYA

JAPANESE BREEDERS’ CHAMPIONSHIP

Time was when the late Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali met in what was dubbed in the “thrilla in Manila” and when George Foreman took on Ali the “rumble in the jungle”, we all thought we’d never see the likes of it again.

Yet, students of the Japanese breeding scene will know that the struggle for local supremacy is a straight-out slugfest between the brothers Yoshida, with Katsumi on our left, and Teruya on our right. Sandwiched in-between is the third umpire, the family-owned Shiraoi Farm, a co-operative venture which suggests that despite their internecine rivalry, the Yoshidas share a mutual admiration, manifested again in their famous Shadai Stallion Station.

The battle for top dog has raged as furiously as ever in 2011, but here it’s not a case of running with the big boys, and having to play dead. The heat is on from the word go, and while there’s some R70 million separating Katsumi’s Northern Farm from Teruya’s Shadai Farm this year, it’s a “mere” R70 million in almost R750 million.

What clinched it for Katsumi’s operation this year was his Northern Farm exacta in Japan’s most celebrated event, the Japan Cup (Gr1), which returned the championship to his operation again after an interlude of a year for Shadai; prior to that there were Summerhill parallels in six consecutive championships for Northern Farm. The extent of the Yoshida domination on Japanese breeding affairs is clear from the table above. Sitting where we are (or anywhere else in the world for that matter) it’s difficult to conceive of the prize money involved, let alone the massive premiums these achievements attract; the second last column expresses the total earnings in Rands; almost three-quarters of a billion to the top farm!

Turning to the sires’ logs, the striking item is the presence of six sons of Sunday Silence in the first ten on the General Sires’ List, while the Juvenile Sires’ Log tells us it’s by no means the end of the story. The first three in that list are all young sons of the greatest stallion Asia has ever known, and arguably one of the best the world has known. All of Daiwa Major, Deep Impact and Agnes Tachyon are by Sunday Silence, and they’ve only just kicked off their careers. It’s entirely conceivable that Japanese breeding can look forward to a rivalry between the top two, of proportions hitherto unwitnessed since the era of Frazier and Ali.

SUNDAY SILENCE : THE RISEN SUN

Click above to watch comprehensive coverage of the Japan Cup…
(Image : Herald Sun - Footage : German Racing Course)

JAPAN CUP (G1)
Tokyo Racecourse, 2400m, Turf
27 November 2011

For some decades now, the Japan Cup has ranked amongst the world’s most wanted prizes, yet it’s a strange quirk of the way things work, that back in their homeland, despite the great horses which have come to conquer from around the globe, the Japanese have maintained a vice-like hold on the outcomes. Yes, there have been the exceptions, but by and large, the Japanese racehorse has made his statement, and the world has finally acknowledged it.

The best in Japan are up there with the best in the world, and this week was no different. The run-away winner in record time of Europe’s most prestigious mile-and-a-half event, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, and her runner-up were there, Danedream and Sharita, and both went off at short odds. Both were denied as Buena Vista, who lost the race in the steward’s room last year, got her revenge with a neck victory in the dying strides. Last season’s Japanese Horse of the Year (and a worthy aspirant for the same title again this year), Buena Vista, is another descendant of the all-conquering Sunday Silence, being a daughter of the accomplished racehorse, Special Week.

The race was a triumph for our friends at Northern Farm, who emulated Summerhill’s Vodacom Durban July exacta this year, with the first and second past the post. Readers of these columns will know that Africa’s only son of Sunday Silence, Admire Main, the joint second top-rated three-year-old of this year, is here courtesy of our relationship with Katsumi Yoshida’s Northern Farm. Was this a “jingle” for those breeders who still have mares to cover and may it be looking for a dimension few others already have? Admire Main’s busy, but he’s not overwhelmed to the degree that he can’t find room for you!

Enquiries :
Linda Norval 27 (0) 33 263 1081
or email linda@summerhill.co.za
www.summerhill.co.za