Question About Colts ?

[The Harlequins]

I have been looking through my older colts, some are really nicely breed in my humble opinion.

There is no way they are going to earn 400,000 -500,000 dollars.which i have seen seems to be the benchmark.

Is it a total NO NO, or is there wriggle room.

Regards Frank.

[Gavin Guile]

Don’t understand your question, if there is one. But the benchmark for colts is really only for studs - they should earn 350k or there will be a “penalty” to them and will not be as good of a sire as he could have been.

[Laura Smith]

There have been examples (lately only in mixed breeds, though) of horses who did not meet the earnings cutoff but actually turned out to be useful sires. Every stallion with earnings under 350k takes the same hit to their sire numbers, but in the rare event that that horse was destined to be a top sire, his numbers will still be good even after the penalty is applied.

That being said, if you want to stand a stallion with low earnings, and you actually want to try to make him a success, you have to be prepared to support him yourself. You won't get any action from outside breeders unless your horse is very well known or has top hypos or both. And if your horse has very few foals in his first year, or they're from bad mares and they gallop poorly, that often is more or less his death knell as a commercial sire. People overwhelmingly look at hypos and gallop %'s when choosing stallions, and there are so many options out there that it's easy to brush off a horse with average stats after his first yearlings gallop.

So I would say, if you're going to try to stand a relatively unknown stallion, you need to have at least 20 quality mares to send to him yourself, and then you run the risk of having 20 bad babies if he turns out to be bad, and if you're a new player with a limited bankroll that's pretty draining. But without those 20 good mares, if you stand a stallion for a value fee of, say, 5k, the only outside mares you might get (if any) are other people's bottom of the barrel, and that's a SURE way to kill stats even for a sire with some potential.

[The Harlequins]

Thank you Laura, for that insight.

I only asked because i have read about superstars on the track being crap in the sack .....to be crude

Just wondered if the reverse was true at times.

Frank

[Carole Hanson]

Certainly can happen the other way too. Reach for the Moon (TS) was a stakes winner but managed to only win a Grade 3 in his career, certainly useful and he did pass the $350k mark but he was no superstar on the track. In the breeding shed though? He was a breed-shaping stallion.

https://www.simhorseracing.com/horse.php?HorseID=238182

I think if you are going to stand a sire that might not be so popular you have to think to yourself, is he worth the $50k I’m gonna have to spend to stand him? Will he make that money back within a season or two?

[The Harlequins]

Am just wrestling in my mind, if i as the trainer did not place the horse in the right races at the right time of his career ,its me that has stopped the horse reaching his max winnings, not the horse.

[Nick Gilmore]

Frank we could answer your question better if you post a link to the horse(s) in question.

[The Harlequins]

Afternoon Nick.

I feel sure if ..George, Kent, or Pete were in charge of this horse.
/www.simhorseracing.com/horse.php?HorseID=1060504

It would reach the 350,000 mark.

[Arthur Cutler]

in Harness racing Cumberbatchbut was an underachiever on the racetrack but was a great sire https://www.simhorseracing.com/horse.php?HorseID=442921

[Carole Hanson]

I’ll be honest, I don’t think that horse will ever make it at stud. It has a decent pedigree but if it’s a Stakes, then it must be a low level stakes. Honestly I’d geld that colt if I were you and put him in allowances/unfilled stakes races (as in look for races for him last minute where he could pick up a cheque, so fields no bigger than 5).

[Stormy Peak]

I have been looking through my older colts, some are really nicely breed in my humble opinion.

There is no way they are going to earn 400,000 -500,000 dollars.which i have seen seems to be the benchmark.

Is it a total NO NO, or is there wriggle room. Regards Frank.

I sometimes, will breed a retired colt that only earned a few hundred thousand, just for the fun of it - mostly because I do like their pedigree. I call the resulting foals, my 'sport horses'. I don't expect anything from these runners, realizing they will probably earn zero on the track, but I run them just for the sheer fun to see if they can earn anything. I use to do it a lot more way back when, as my focus back then was different...I was more into experimenting and in 'rescuing' horses from AJ, that I thought I could make money with, because the prior owner was running the horse as the wrong distance, or wrong surface, or wasn't giving it any rest and it was probably just flat out tired.

Anyway... I have had a few horses who if I had retired them at age 4 or 5 might not have hit that $350,000 mark that is needed so a stallion doesn't get penalized. I ran them until they were sometimes 7 years old...and then retired them and bred some nice mares to them and got what I would call "Useful" offspring. Mostly claimers, some productive and allowance types....but all still pretty capable of earning their keep.

This guy is one of mine I did that with:
Boomshakalaka

His sire, Fortification and Fortifications's sire, Storm The Blockade both won SC races. Both were not that successful at stud though...mediocre stats for the most part. I retired Boomshakalaka at age 8, because I was trying to get him over that $350K mark and because I enjoyed running him.
Right now his 2 year olds are averaging about $12,000, with his best one earning around $51,000 - I'm going to keep sending some nice mares to him, in hopes of hitting that magic and getting another SC winner from that line...lol. But then, too, I can afford to do stuff like that. I admit, it's not good business sense, a waste of money more than likely. But I also like to have fun in other ways in this game other than chasing down the dollars - so if I can afford it, I will play around doing stuff like this.

If you have some colts you are not sure will make enough money, you could try running them longer to see if you can get them to cross that monetary line so they won't be penalized. But as others have said, don't expect any commercial value from them.

Also... I've had millionaire after millionaire of pretty decently bred studs just fail the breeding shed. I don't know if I've just be horribly unlucky in that regard, or if that's pretty par for course...most stallions are not going to be huge draws for outside mares due to mediocre stats - and you need to keep your expectations real when it comes to putting up a stallion, regardless of it's pedigree and earnings. Most people are just not going to get a super stud.

Stormy

[Andrew Chillin]

Wow that horse isn’t fit to sire county fair show ponies.

[Stormy Peak]

Wow that horse isn’t fit to sire county fair show ponies.

I've been here since 2006, I see that you joined in Jan 2020....and yet you are an expert at what constitutes a stallion that can't even throw 'show ponies' ?

Boomshakalaka already has 1 foal in his first crop - that at age 2, has earned over $50,000. Some Expensive stallions with great pedigrees, who have earned over a million dollars often end up with foals that can't even earn that much during a 5 year racing career. There are also multi million dollar stallions out there with good pedigrees that have never sired a stakes winner.

He had 15 foals in his first crop....most are claimers, but that doesn't mean they can't make a nice some of money in their career...and also...most of his foals are either Late Bloomers, or Progressive type, so I expect as 3 year olds, his foals will make be useful and it's not a big stretch to believe they could earn $20K on up, which is a chance at a nice profit if someone wanted to splurge the huge amount of $3,000 for his stud fee.

Boomshakalaka, has a decent pedigree, with 2 SC winners with his sire and grandsire, his dam was a formidable type and she earned a bit over $75,000 on the track, so again, she was a useful type horse.

And as for Boomshakalaka, he earned a hair over $600,000 in his career - which is over the $350,000 mark needed for a stallion to not be penalized. His wins included 8 non-graded stake races.

I'm using him for two reasons, I think he can put some useful runners in my barn. I'm also seeing if I can get a great slide with him and a nice mare and end up with a 3rd SC winner from this lineage.

My whole point to my post was to point out a 'decent' colt can be useful in some barns as a stud, but unless they start throwing out stake winning offspring, they won't be successful commercial stallions. This doesn't mean the horse is trash, as you implied.
And there is that rare chance he might end up with a number of really good numbers...as stated by others here, it happens on rare occasions that a horse that didn't go all gang busters on the track ends up being a nice stallion.

Boomshakalaka falls into my own category of a horse that can sire useful runners.... a 'value stallion' And I think your remark about him is insultive and off the mark.

Stormy

[Katie Stepanian]

Whilst I think the remark might have been about Frank’s colt, it is still rude and uncalled for.

[Dylan Christensen]

Wow that horse isn’t fit to sire county fair show ponies.

I've been here since 2006, I see that you joined in Jan 2020....and yet you are an expert at what constitutes a stallion that can't even throw 'show ponies' ?

Boomshakalaka already has 1 foal in his first crop - that at age 2, has earned over $50,000. Some Expensive stallions with great pedigrees, who have earned over a million dollars often end up with foals that can't even earn that much during a 5 year racing career. There are also multi million dollar stallions out there with good pedigrees that have never sired a stakes winner.

He had 15 foals in his first crop....most are claimers, but that doesn't mean they can't make a nice some of money in their career...and also...most of his foals are either Late Bloomers, or Progressive type, so I expect as 3 year olds, his foals will make be useful and it's not a big stretch to believe they could earn $20K on up, which is a chance at a nice profit if someone wanted to splurge the huge amount of $3,000 for his stud fee.

Boomshakalaka, has a decent pedigree, with 2 SC winners with his sire and grandsire, his dam was a formidable type and she earned a bit over $75,000 on the track, so again, she was a useful type horse.

And as for Boomshakalaka, he earned a hair over $600,000 in his career - which is over the $350,000 mark needed for a stallion to not be penalized. His wins included 8 non-graded stake races.

I'm using him for two reasons, I think he can put some useful runners in my barn. I'm also seeing if I can get a great slide with him and a nice mare and end up with a 3rd SC winner from this lineage.

My whole point to my post was to point out a 'decent' colt can be useful in some barns as a stud, but unless they start throwing out stake winning offspring, they won't be successful commercial stallions. This doesn't mean the horse is trash, as you implied.
And there is that rare chance he might end up with a number of really good numbers...as stated by others here, it happens on rare occasions that a horse that didn't go all gang busters on the track ends up being a nice stallion.

Boomshakalaka falls into my own category of a horse that can sire useful runners.... a 'value stallion' And I think your remark about him is insultive and off the mark.

Stormy

I don't think he was talking to you