Atkins Hopes to Find 'What Dreams R Made Of' at Fasig

Starting CASA Farms was a dream come true for Susie Atkins and a mare appropriately named Whatdreamsrmadeof (Graeme Hall) took the breeder's hopes to a new level when she produced MGISW Curalina (Curlin). Atkins hopes the now

12-year-old mare, who is back in foal to Curlin, will add another feather to both of their caps when she sells as Hip 100 at Monday's Fasig-Tipton November Sale.

“It just seemed like everything was lining up in the right spot and she is a standout,” Atkins said when asked her reason for selling her prized mare. “To make that decision has been extremely difficult, but my farm is a business so I have to make good business decisions. I think this is a good business decision, but as a personal decision it is extremely tough.”

Atkins and her late husband Clint, who was part owner of the radio control company Hobby Co. and was also involved in real estate, were inspired to get into racing after a trip to the GI Kentucky Derby. D. Wayne Lukas purchased their first yearlings in 2003 and they bought their own farm the following year.

“After the first year, we saw how wonderful it would be to have a Kentucky home and a farm,” Atkins recalled. “I found a farm on Old Frankfort Pike and refurbished that in 2004. I was really, really busy with the horses and everything that happens around horses. I didn't have any experience in horses, other than the love of the horse. I've just been very fortunate from racing to getting a farm then breeding and it's just been a lot of fun.”

Atkins, who bought her first broodmare at Keeneland in 2005, purchased Whatdreamsrmadeof privately from Bertram and Elaine Klein during her 3-year-old season on the advice of trainer Tom Amoss. Only worse than second once in five starts up until that point, the New York-bred won a Fair Grounds allowance in her first race for Atkins and was third next out in the GII Fair Grounds Oaks behind subsequent Grade I winner Mistical Plan (Game Plan).

“I purchased the mare when she was on the track in February 2007,” Atkins said. “She was one of the top fillies and was headed to the [Fair Grounds Oaks]. She placed in the race, but she also broke her sesamoid so she was retired. We took her to the farm, took good care of her and bred her the following year.”

Two of Whatdreamsrmadeof's first three foals were winners, but neither garnered any black-type. In 2011, after the mare produced her first filly Dream Spinner (Hard Spun), Atkins made the fateful decision to breed her to four-time Eclipse winner Curlin, whose first progeny had yet to hit the racetrack.

“[The decision] to breed to Curlin was very easy,” the 70-year-old said. “I just admired him so much when he was on the racetrack. Then seeing him in person, he was so impressive. He was a very easy horse to fall in love with.”

The Illinois native turned Lexington resident added, “I had bred him the previous year to my other top racehorse [MGSW] Baghdaria (Royal Academy). Curlin offspring are just extremely special. They are very, very inquisitive. They are very happy, very busy and affectionate.”

That mating produced Curalina, who sold to Eclipse Thoroughbreds and Dogwood Stable for just $125,000 at the 2013 Keeneland September sale, but has gone on to earn over $1.5 million on the racetrack.

“She has proven she is the best horse I've ever bred,” Atkins remarked. “She was a standout, both physically and personality-wise from the start. She has just always been such a little darling. She always loved to take her naps in the afternoon, but when it was time to play, she was always the most active and so happy. When it came time to take her to the sale, which is always such a difficult thing to do, she handled it like a true lady. She was a nice-sized chestnut filly, very pretty and very alert.”

Curalina scored what would be the first of three Grade I wins with a late charge to take the 2015 GI Acorn S. by a neck. The Todd Pletcher pupil crossed the line a nose short of MGISW I'm a Chatterbox (Munnings) in Saratoga's GI CCA Oaks the following month, but was awarded the victory after that rival was disqualifed for interference in the stretch.

Third in last term's GI Breeders' Cup Distaff, the chestnut kicked off this term with a dominant 7 1/2-length decision in the GI La Troienne S. May 6 and rebounded from a rare off the board effort in the GI Ogden Phipps S. June 11 with another decisive victory in the GIII Shuvee H. Runner-up to Cavorting (Bernardini) in the GI Personal Ensign S. Aug. 27, she was sixth in a Distaff for the ages Nov. 4 and sells just 22 hips after her dam Monday night (hip 123).

“I got to see her in the Distaff last year at Keeneland,” Atkins said, choking up with emotion. “I thought she just did a wonderful job. I mean every race she's been in. Two that she placed in, she may not have come in first, but each race she had thrown a shoe and still placed in her graded stakes, so I think that is a pretty good horse.”

Curalina was one of the final horses Atkins bred with her husband before his passing in 2011, making the achievement extra special.

“It's definitely special,” she commented. “He gave me a wonderful opportunity. He let me do anything I wanted. There were no restrictions on anything with the farm or with the horses.”

After Curalina, Whatdreamsrmadeof is also responsible for the unraced 3-year-old Only by the Night (Tale of the Cat), a $150,000 KEESEP yearling who brought $350,000 from Ashview Farm as a 2-year-old at last year's Keeneland November sale. In 2014. she produced a Shackleford colt that Atkins unfortunately had to put to sleep and in June of 2015 she had a colt by Tale of the Cat. The chestnut was given 2016 off and got back in foal to Curlin on her first cover this spring.

“When she had the Shackleford colt, he was a beautiful colt, but he had a cleft palate,” Atkins recounted. “With a cleft palate, there isn't too much of an opportunity for them to be successful. I just really couldn't see him trying to fight that, so that was a decision I made to have him put down. I bred her to Tale of the Cat and she had that colt in June, so when I was going to be breeding again, I was most likely to get a mid-June foal again. There is a time in a broodmare's life when you have to make the decision to give them a year off. I felt it was time for me to give her a break and that is why I didn't breed her back.”

Atkins, whose favorite Curalina story is when she sang the then month old filly to sleep when she became upset during her dam's return to the breeding shed, is very hands on with her six-horse broodmare band and all of her foals. It was a no brainer for her to miss watching Curalina at Santa Anita this weekend in order to be with Whatdreamsrmadeof when she left to join the Brookdales Sales consignment at Fasig and she will be in attendance Monday night to watch the pair sell.

“I will definitely be at the sale,” Atkins remarked. “That's why I'm here on the farm [instead of at the Breeders' Cup]. When 'Dreams' goes over to Fasig, I'll be going with her. I will be visiting her off and on. That's just what I do.”

The Fasig-Tipton November sale gets underway at 5:00 p.m. Monday in Lexington.