Exosphere A Credit To Sir Ivor Line

By John Berry

The win of Exosphere (Aus) in the G1 Golden Rose in Sydney on Saturday is a great result for the colt’s owner/breeder Sheikh Mohammed, for his sire Lonhro (Aus) and for the Sir Ivor sireline.

Winner of the G1 2000 Guineas, Derby, Champion S. and Washington DC International in 1968, Sir Ivor retired to Claiborne in 1969. He sired plenty of good racehorses and broodmares, but as a sire of sires he was a non-achiever–with one glorious exception.

Sir Tristram (Ire) was far from the best racehorse sired by Sir Ivor, recording merely two minor wins in France from 19 starts. Of no interest to breeders in the States and Europe, he was bought by Patrick Hogan, a young studmaster in New Zealand who was, presumably, influenced by the fact that Sir Tristram came from the same family as the influential stallions Hyperion, Sickle, Pharamond, Hunter’s Moon and Mossborough. From his base at Cambridge Stud, Sir Tristram proved easily the best stallion sired by Sir Ivor, ultimately setting a new world record for individual Group/Grade 1 winners (45).

Patrick (now Sir Patrick) Hogan always said that he would wait until he was confident that he had found Sir Tristram’s successor before adding a son of the patriarch to the roster at Cambridge Stud. Eventually he decided that he had found him: Zabeel (NZ), winner in 1990 of the G1 VRC Australian Guineas in the colors of Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum. Zabeel duly turned out to be easily the most successful of the 14 sons of Sir Tristram who sired at least one Group 1 winner. Zabeel’s sons included two horses who were voted Horse of the Year in Australia: the outstanding gelding Might And Power (NZ) and 10-time Group 1 winner Octagonal (NZ).

Bred by Cambridge Stud from its outstanding matron Eight Carat (GB), Octagonal was raced by Jack and Bob Ingham, whose Woodlands Stud was the largest and most successful owner/breeder operation in Australia. Octagonal got off to a flying start at Woodlands with his first winner Lonhro (Aus), who eventually won one more Group 1 race than his father had done as well as becoming (in 2003/04) Australia’s only Horse of the Year sired by a previous Horse of the Year.

Sheikh Mohammed bought Woodlands Stud and its stock from the Ingham family in May of 2008. Lonhro was unproven as a stallion at the time, but he has subsequently proved himself world-class, not least by being champion sire in 2010/11. That achievement prompted a period of reverse-shuttling to Jonabell Farm in Kentucky beginning in 2012, in which year he was represented in Australia by the G1 Golden Slipper winner Pierro (Aus).

Among the races that have helped to cement Lonhro’s reputation as a stallion has been the Golden Rose, run at Rosehill each spring. This race, formerly known as the Peter Pan S., was given its current title in 2003 in an effort to boost its status, the implication being that it had become for spring 3-year-olds what the Golden Slipper is for autumn 2-year-olds. It had previously carried Group 2 status and been a lead-up race for more important events later in the spring, but since 2003 it has been promoted as a championship race in its own right (and has carried Group 1 status since 2009).

The first G1 Golden Rose was won by a Woodlands-bred, Darley-raced son of Lonhro: Denman (Aus). Now, the 2015 version has seen another Darley homebred Lonhro colt, Exosphere (Aus), take the race.

Winner to date of four of his six starts, Exosphere was an impressive winner of the Golden Rose, skipping past the leader at the top of the straight en route to a 2.3-length victory. He had won the G2 Run To The Rose two weeks previously, while the highlight of his juvenile campaign had been an impressive victory in the G2 Skyline S.

Exosphere’s dam, Altitude (Aus), was a multiple winner in Melbourne. As she is by Danzero (Aus) from a mare by Marscay (Aus), her merit can be attributed in part to two of Australia’s most notable stallions of recent decades. Danzero–a member of the first Australian crop of Danehill–and the Star Kingdom-line sire Marscay each won the Golden Slipper and each sired a Golden Slipper winner: Bint Marscay (Aus) and Dance Hero (Aus), respectively.

A colt of immense potential, Exosphere is raced by the most international racing and breeding operation in the world. After the Golden Rose, his trainer John O’Shea (who is private trainer to Sheikh Mohammed in Australia) remarked, “A horse like Exosphere has international appeal and you never know where he will end up.”