European Value Sires: Part I–the Young Guns

Turning back to Europe, immediately after compiling an equivalent series on Kentucky sires, has proved highly instructive.

Contrary to the lazy European stereotype, it has been striking how much commercial mileage an American stallion can gain today from trying to breed a proper, hardy, progressive two-turn horse; certainly relative to horses of similar substance in Europe. And that reflects a broader diversity in the American scene–whether in terms of bloodlines, or farms, or even aspirations. In contrast, the European market can appear to be stricken, in many sectors, by a failure of imagination.

The hegemony of Galileo (Ire), and the proliferation of his sons, does make for a challenge. And not just because Frankel (GB), in racing to the front in the competition between his heirs, is not going solve many people's problems at £175,000. But that does not explain why commercial breeders should have washed their hands of taking on a tiny coterie of perceived Classic operations, instead obsessing with sires that might conceivably (but almost certainly won't) produce an Ascot 2-year-old.

Never mind that such projects are generally a busted flush by June; never mind, either, that there is far better residual value in the longer-term, longer-distance types, thanks either to wealthy jumping yards or even wealthier Australians.

Never mind, come to that, that this whole approach will ultimately dilute precisely those races we have been able to rely upon, generation after generation, to signpost those horses with genetic qualities meriting replication. Yes, it's not easy to win Classics if you can't get anywhere near the six-figure covers; but Enable (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}) and Golden Horn (GB) (Cape Cross {Ire}) were bred by sires who had respectively started at £20,000 or would shortly afterwards finish at €20,000.

So it's the old story, really: are you trying to breed a yearling or a racehorse? Perhaps somebody, some day, might even explain why these should be viewed as incompatible priorities. For now, however, that context makes a perilously moving target of “value.”

In terms of turning a profit, value tends to be about cynically catching a brief tide in the career of a young stallion. And those same trends have a disastrous impact on value, in terms of breeding a runner. The sire who fails to make you a fast buck soon pays a heavy price; his book sizes collapse, and so does his fee. So how can he be value today, when tomorrow he will be covering half the mares at half the price?

Stubbornly, however, let's take a look at each category of sire–by career stage–and, after paying due courtesy to the divisional leaders, try to find one that might punch above his weight. And over the next couple of days, as we start dealing with stallions with some actual runs on the board, we'll be picking out a good deal more.

Sires With First Covers in 2018…

In the end, I guess, the market gets what it deserves. So with as many as 60 rookies starting up in Britain, Ireland and France, the ravenous commercial appetite for unproven sires may be spread so thinly that it will drag a few over the cliff even before their limitations can be exposed by their first runners.

Since few will ever again stand at a fee as high as their opening one, it is arguable that this whole sector should be bypassed in any quest for “value”. On the other hand, they will often get at least that early wave to ride at the sales.

Either way, sheer numbers will necessarily make this a fairly random browse. But those heading the roster certainly earned the right to do so.

Ribchester (GB) (Iffraaj {GB}) (Kildangan Stud, €30,000) is a multiple Group 1 winner at a mile tracing to none other than Fall Aspen as fifth dam, while stablemates Caravaggio (Scat Daddy) (Coolmore, €35,000) and Churchill (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) (Coolmore, €35,000) both stake a claim to succeed their respective supersires.

Both were Group 1 winners at two and three, Caravaggio commercially turbo-charged with speed and precocity and Churchill just the complete package. He's such an imposing specimen, and with a ton of maternal speed (and Storm Cat class) to balance the potency of his sire. This latter aspect has, of course, meanwhile been amplified by little sister Clemmie (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}), whose Group 1 success over as short as six furlongs was unprecedented in all the epic achievements of their sire.

Churchill is hardly short of competition among sons of Galileo even on his home farm. And you have to say that another such, Highland Reel (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) (Coolmore, €17,500), is entitled to feel insulted in starting at half the price.

No, he probably won't be siring a Norfolk winner any time soon, but he has been a paragon of class, toughness and durability, and has the blood to bed it down. Let's hope he is not as underestimated in his second career as he was for so long during his first, before ending up the richest earner trained in Europe.

The great patriarch also launches the most expensive among new British sires in Ulysses (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) (Cheveley Park, £30,000). With maturity, Ulysses rubbed shoulders with Europe's best absolutely on level terms. And, though famously a son of an Oaks winner in Light Shift (Kingmambo), herself out of a Shirley Heights mare, he did race with plenty of dash, perhaps tracing to that Mr. P/Miesque blend in the damsire.

Much the most costly recruit in France offers a very different flavour. Almanzor (Fr) (Wootton Bassett {Fr}) (Haras d'Etreham, €35,000) joins his sire in Normandy after gaining scant reward for his sporting perseverance on the track last year. His misfortunes should not diminish memories of his brilliance, not least as an outcross family tree introduces a strand of Northern Dancer only in the fifth generation.

Those are the headline acts, along with the handsome Postponed (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}) (Dalham Hall, £20,000), but it would be invidious to know where to halt a more extensive list.

With El Kabeir (Scat Daddy) (Yeomanstown, €8,000), perhaps, as a typically astute flourish by the farm that has turned Dark Angel (Ire) into such a colossus. This exotic dasher is an intriguing addition to the race–a race against time, of course–to find an heir to his tragic sire.

Then there's a striking injection of fresh blood at the National Stud. Aclaim (Ire) (Acclamation {GB}) (National Stud UK, £12,500), for instance, underpins his allure as a son of the sire of Dark Angel with a half-sister to Montjeu (Ire) himself as second dam. But for sheer enterprise the farm deserves even more credit for managing to import the first son of Australia's record-breaking champion sire to stand in Europe.

The fact that Spill The Beans (Aus) (Snitzel {Aus}) (National Stud UK, £6,000) was the busiest freshman in Australia, covering 202 mares, tells Northern Hemisphere breeders all they need to know about his physique, as well as his unbeaten juvenile campaign and a Group 2 success against older sprinters over 6.5f at three.

Among all the quantity, there is some authentic Group 1 quality available at what appear to be pretty reasonable fees. Barney Roy (GB) (Excelebration {Ire}) (Dalham Hall, £10,000), certainly, looks generously priced as a track-record St James's Palace winner; Brametot (Ire) (Rajsaman {Fr}) (Haras de Bouquetot, €10,000), likewise, and Wings Of Eagles (Fr) (Pour Moi {Ire}) (Haras de Montaigu, €12,000) for their Classic deeds; while Decorated Knight (GB) (Galileo {Ire}) (Irish National Stud, €15,000) would arguably be of interest, out of a sister to Giant's Causeway with all that entails, if he'd never even left his stable–never mind as winner of three Group 1 races last year.

Much the same might also be said, however, of our speculative pick among these, the youngest of the young guns:

ZARAK (FR) (Dubawi {Ire}) (Haras de Bonneval, €12,000)

Overall, his mighty dam Zarkava (Fr) (Zamindar) has not had the best of luck in her own second career. But Zarak's sire has shown that even a legacy as massive as that of Dubai Millennium needs only one eligible conduit–and that could yet prove the case here.

As a 3-year-old, after all, Zarak twice finished second only to the outstanding European colt of his generation in Almanzor (including in the sire-anointing Prix du Jockey-Club); and he formally cemented his Group 1 calibre last year in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.

Zarkava, remember, combined the work of two modern breeding greats in the Aga Khan and Juddmonte, the latter furnishing her sire Zamindar (Gone West) who is already damsire of two coveted young stallions in Kingman (GB) (Invincible Spirit {Ire}) and, on the same cross as Zarak, New Bay (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}).

As such, Zarak only had to show a basic competence for elite competition to deserve the chance to recycle some of the most priceless genes in the modern Stud Book. He did a lot more than that, showing real flair on occasion; and he really looks the part, too. Above all, he will have every chance to earn higher fees with the company he is likely to keep at his opening one.

Sires With First Weanlings in 2018…

For now these, too, remain subject to the same caveats as the group above. Certainly using the covering sires' sales index as any kind of clue to the marketability of their foals is like selecting a high school soccer team in a maternity ward. Regardless, they all had their billboards up this time last year, so after a nod at the two with most to deliver–in terms of expectations–we'll just highlight one who appeals strongly to make the grade.

Both the two most expensive sires of the intake have held their opening fees. Shalaa (Ire) (Invincible Spirit {Ire}) (Haras de Bouquetot, €27,500), whose parents both count Danzig as grandsire, is a Middle Park winner out of a half-sister to a Middle Park winner. He was honoured by an extraordinary first book featuring Treve (Fr) (Motivator {GB}) and La Cressonniere (Fr) (Le Havre {Ire}), plus the dams of Avenir Certain (Fr) (Le Havre {Ire}) and The Fugue (GB) (Dansili {GB}) among 158 altogether.

The Gurkha (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) (Coolmore, €25,000) was the other heavy gun rolled into position. Not too many sons contesting the legacy of his farm's champion sire are dual Group 1 winners at a mile; while his dam, a group winner at two, is out of a half-sister to Arc winner Solemia (Ire) (Poliglote {Fr}) and two other siblings placed at Group 1 level, from the family of Green Dancer. He received 21 black-type winners in a first book of 175.

But here's one bubbling under who looks massively eligible to build up from less than half that kind of money:

VADAMOS (FR) (Monsun {Ger}) (Tally-Ho, €10,000)

If some of us rather despair over the vogue for colts retired sound at two, then we certainly can't blame the farms serving that market. It's the breeders who make it viable; the breeders, who exalted Mehmas (Ire) (Acclamation {GB}) (Tally-Ho, €10,000) as the busiest of his intake with 187 mares.

How nice to see, then, that the same farm is applying its remarkable expertise–cute enough, be it noted, to give Mehmas a trim from €12,500 to keep his first wave going–to a very different model in Vadamos: a horse of sturdy blood who raced, very sturdily indeed, through four seasons.

Though he won over 12f earlier in his career, he ultimately proved top-class at a bare mile–beaten just half a length by Ribchester (Ire) (Iffraaj {GB}) (who has started at treble the fee) in the Marois before gaining his deserved Group 1 laurels in the Moulin.

That qualified Vadamos as arguably the most accomplished son of his outstanding sire; and surely the sharpest. It figures, you know: his stakes-winning dam is a half-sister to a Queen Anne and Prix d'Ispahan winner, Valixir (Fr) (Trempolino), as well as to the dam of two Prix Saint-Alary winners; and the next dam is a half-sister to Breeders' Cup Mile winner Val Royal (Fr) (Royal Academy). You also find French Classic winners Valyra (GB) (Azamour {Ire}) and Vahorimix (Fr) (Linamix {Fr}) close up.

A copper-bottomed family, then, in the hands of a farm that really knows how to make a sire in the commercial market. Its stalwart Kodiac (GB) (Danehill) has just broken the record for individual juvenile winners in a calendar year. Kodiac had no fewer than four freshmen sons cover over 400 mares between them in this intake. But while they will all major in speed, here's a newcomer to the practical end of the market–184 mares in his first season, right up there with Mehmas–who could legitimately sire a Classic type. Vadamos? Let's go!

Sires With First Yearlings in 2018…

This is the intake that will typically begin to pay a price for the glib commercial appeal of their initial two seasons, many taking a fee cut as they sweat out the first market returns. As such, it generally takes a leap of faith to find “value” that plays out any time soon.

But that vividly did not apply to the horse who bestrode his class in their first sales test. Muhaarar (GB) (Oasis Dream {GB}) (Nunnery, £30,000), handsome and well bred, had matched sire and grandsire by winning the July Cup. And his transition to a second career has been managed with a commendable lack of avarice, an indulgent opening price being held despite the opening sales bonanza enjoyed by those fortunate enough to get into his sensibly limited books.

A dozen weanlings sold brought a spectacular average of 202,987gns. Judging from a first book of 129 containing 19 Group 1 or Classic winners/producers, plenty of his patrons have been breeding to run. At market, then, he looks certain to remain a valuable commodity. If you can get a mare to him, the fee will look not just value but pretty much a privilege.

Golden Horn (GB) (Cape Cross {Ire}) (Dalham Hall, £60,000) has managed to hold his fee as the highest of the class. Somehow his sire never achieved the commercial appeal he absolutely merited, but the farm that stood Cape Cross has put its shoulder to the wheel: Golden Horn's first book included six Group 1 winners and 43 group producers. His first weanlings did the necessary, at an average 160,944gns.

The big gun starting up for Darley's big rival, Gleneagles (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) (Coolmore, €40,000) moved on 19 foals at 93,589gns off an opening cover of €60,000. But his farm had already shown characteristic decision in an immediate 33% cut, and his family has meanwhile become more glamorous than ever thanks to the Group 1 exploits last year of little sister Happily (Galileo).

The popularity of Gutaifan (Ire) (Dark Angel {Ire}) (Yeomanstown, €10,000) comes as no surprise, given the market's infatuation with stallions that are not just precocious but merely adolescent. Of course, the same farm has achieved a genuine phenomenon using the same template with his sire; with due acumen, acumen, meanwhile he was trimmed from an opening €12,500 despite entertaining a staggering 203 partners for his debut season. No fewer than 59 sent straight to market found new homes at a perfectly workable 36,329gns.

At least Hot Streak (Ire) (Iffraaj {GB}) (Tweenhills, £6,000) had the decency to persevere on the track despite having proved himself every bit as fast and precocious at two, in fact classier too–second in the Middle Park seven days after melting the clock in the Cornwallis. He consolidated that profile by making all in the G2 Temple and going down by barely a length in the Nunthorpe and King's Stand; he is, moreover, out of a granddaughter of Height Of Fashion herself. So to have shifted as many as 35 of 39 weanlings offered, at an average 21,222gns, looks auspicious.

A similarly impressive clearance rate was achieved, at 19,648gns, by Due Diligence (War Front) (Whitsbury Manor, £5,000). This horse has an interesting commercial profile, runner-up against older horses in the Diamond Jubilee after an eight-length debut win at Saratoga in his American youth. A Commonwealth Cup winner–as he might well have been, given the chance–would typically command a higher fee and the first son of his outstanding sire to retire to a British stud has been presented at very realistic fees.

Night Of Thunder (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}) (Dalham Hall, £15,000) made a much stronger sales debut than a halved opening fee this year might imply. The same farm also hosts Brazen Beau (Aus) (I Am Invincible {Aus}) (Dalham Hall, £7,000). He is admittedly pretty light on family but offers twin stems of Danzig and would set you back the equivalent of £25,000 in his homeland, where they know just how strong, well balanced and fast a sprinter he was.

But here's one who might warrant the leap of faith implied in his name:

MAKE BELIEVE (GB) (Makfi {GB}) (Ballylinch, €15,000)

Whether he can establish his own sire as a major conduit of Dubawi (Ire) remains to be seen, but everything else is in place: Make Believe is in the very best of hands, a superb physical specimen, and matches a Group 1 cutting edge at 7-8f with a solid pedigree.

His three-parts sister Dubawi Heights (GB) is a dual Grade I winner and their dam is out of the Classic-placed My Branch (GB) (Distant Relative {GB}), who also produced a G1 Haydock Sprint Cup winner in Tante Rose (Ire) (Barathea {Ire}). Further back the family has plenty of Jim Joel Classic blood: My Branch's third dam was a half-sister to Guineas and Derby winner Royal Palace and also to the dam of Classic winners Fairy Footsteps and Light Cavalry.

Make Believe was unbeaten at two, broke clear from the front in the Poulains and, clearly not himself at Ascot, bounced back to break the course record with a decisive success in the G1 Prix de la Foret.

He has needed a trim, in common with so many in the intake, from an opening €20,000; nor did his foals exactly go through the roof at 30,256gns. But they achieved a very high clearance rate, and everything about his profile promises only progress with time.

Yes, it's the brave time to get involved with any of this intake. But remember how Makfi blossomed from two to three; remember how Dubawi was allowed to slip to €15,000 for his fourth season; remember how Dubai Millennium himself went from strength to strength. And foals conceived this spring will be going to the yearling sale just as Make Believe's debut crop–from 120 mares covered–have shown what they can do as 3-year-olds.

And the sire-line, the physique and the farm together strongly suggest you might find yourself with a valuable commodity on your hands, at that stage, so long as you keep the faith this spring.

And the Judges Say…

JAMIE RAILTON

We're very short of proven stallions at a working man's price. The one that springs to mind, in the sub-20 grand bracket, is Havana Gold (Ire) (Teofilo {Ire}) (Tweenhills, £15,000). Though he hasn't had two crops of racing age yet, it would be a surprise if he didn't produce 3-year-olds as a son of Teofilo (Ire) who was himself a better 3-year-old. Yes, he has to do that. But right now he's looking pretty obvious value.

In Tuesday's edition, look for European Value Sires: Part II–Sires Getting Started on the Track. For Chris McGrath's three part American Where's the Value series, visit: Part I, Part II, and Part III