Prizemoney has soared to an all-time high in Australian racing and is showing no signs of slowing down. In just 10 years, total annual stakes of $422 million have almost doubled to $717 million this season.
In an era of such dizzying increases, the only constant is black type – a commodity prized throughout the thoroughbred breeding world.
Stakes winners and black-type performance are a key part of any breeding analysis, and the foundation of most evaluations of a stallion’s merits. However, the Australian sires’ premiership still recognises a season’s champion sire based strictly on their progeny’s prize-money accumulation.
Black Type pinnacle
This season I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit {IRE}) eclipsed Danehill (USA) (Danzig {USA}) and Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice) to set a new single-season record of 28 individual stakes winners. However, he sits in a distant second place on the premiership and will not be crowned champion sire at the end of this month.
Perhaps the time has come to consider a fairer method of evaluating our leading sires?
My proposal is for Australian sires’ tables to be based on points accumulated in stakes races – and some of the new big-money events that are starting to be held in similar esteem. My belief is that this would provide a fairer and more definitive indicator of our leading sires.
Given the new prizemoney landscape, I believe most breeders would agree that the stallion recognised as Australia’s best should be the one who provides the most black-type horses, as opposed to the accumulated earnings of their progeny.
"The stallion recognised as Australia’s best should be the one who provides the most black-type horses." - Ryan McEvoy
In order to initiate a change like this, co-operation would obviously be required from the major jurisdictions and those compiling the data.
Under this proposed points system, a Group 1 win would be worth 100 points, with 75 for second, 60 for third, 40 for fourth and 20 for fifth. Those amounts are then reduced through the grades, with 75 points for winning a Group 2, 50 for a Group 3 and 25 for a Listed. The distribution continues with 15 points for the winner a standard Saturday metropolitan race, 8 for a midweek, all the way down to a single point for non-tab and picnic meetings.
| 1st | 100 | 75 | 50 | 25 | 20 | 15 | 8 | 5 | 3 | 1 |
| 2nd | 75 | 50 | 40 | 19 | 12 | 8 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 0 |
| 3rd | 60 | 35 | 25 | 14 | 8 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 |
| 4th | 40 | 25 | 14 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 5th | 20 | 12 | 10 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
*Group 1 or $3million + in prizemoney
Table: Proposed points table
A prizemoney column would still remain a constant in premiership tables, much like the number of winners, stakes winners, etc. However, as per the grand suggestion, the order of stallions would simply reflect most points accumulated.
How would this season’s sires stack up?
As an example, the table below shows that by a stakes-race application of this criteria, I Am Invincible would be this season’s champion sire in Australia.
Not a Single Doubt (Redoute’s Choice), who sits fifth on the prize-money premiership, moves up to second on these standings with 2681 points. Fastnet Rock (Danehill {USA}), fourth on the premiership, is one place higher here with 2572 points. Street Cry (IRE) (Machiavellian {USA}) sits in fourth position with 2224 points.
Premiership leader Snitzel dips to fifth with 2114 points, while a notable improver on the list is Lonhro (Octagonal {NZ}), who rises from 12th on the premiership to eighth on these standings with 1760 points.
| 1 | I AM INVINCIBLE | $17,214,623 | 28 | 3698 |
| 2 | NOT A SINGLE DOUBT | $11,598,738 | 13 | 2681 |
| 3 | FASTNET ROCK | $12,379,505 | 10 | 2572 |
| 4 | STREET CRY | $15,825,613 | 7 | 2224 |
| 5 | SNITZEL | $23,814,315 | 12 | 2114 |
| 6 | SEBRING | $11,194,750 | 11 | 1846 |
| 7 | REDOUTE'S CHOICE | $9,556,708 | 6 | 1776 |
| 8 | LONHRO | $8,868,062 | 8 | 1760 |
| 9 | HIGH CHAPPARAL | $9,494,203 | 11 | 1571 |
| 10 | PIERRO | $9,236,575 | 8 | 1411 |
Table: Points table (based on stakes racing only) up to end of Queensland Carnival
The new kids on the block
We cannot overlook the big-money races that, despite not having or being yet to receive black-type status, are taking Australian racing by storm.
The Everest will carry a stake of $14 million in 2019, and Sydney’s spectacular sprint has been acclaimed by form analysts as a truly Group 1-quality field.
"We cannot overlook the big-money races that, despite not having or being yet to receive black-type status, are taking Australian racing by storm." - Ryan McEvoy
The inaugural $5 million All-Star Mile in Melbourne also attracted a stellar line-up, and the Golden Eagle is set to be an explosive new addition to the calendar with a $7.5 million stake this spring.
The quality of the fields these big-money events are attracting makes them worthy of 100 points in our system – the same as Group 1 races. The suggestion here is that, along with Group 1 events, all races worth $3 million or more fall into this elite category.
Connections of Redzel celebrate after the Snitzel gelding's second victory
Points per starter
Another measure of a stallion’s prowess could be to calculate their points against their number of starters in a season.
Going through the top ten stallions in our table, I Am Invincible’s 3698 points have come from 329 runners, which is an average of 11.24 points per runner.
Not a Single Doubt’s average is 11.92 (2681 points, 225 runners), Fastnet Rock’s is 9.56 (2572 points, 269 runners), and Snitzel’s is slightly lower at 6.19 (2114 points, 341 runners).
The best average in our top 10 belongs to Street Cry, best known in this part of the world as the sire of legendary mare Winx. He ranks fourth on our table with 2224 points, but has been represented by only 121 starters this season – an impressive average of 18.38 points per runner.
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