‘Which ones do you keep and which ones do you sell?’: Emirates Park matings mix revealed

Cover image courtesy of Emirates Park

Emirates Park has had a vintage year, and there’s still time left on the calendar. In January, it sold a pair of $1.6 million colts on the Gold Coast, the latest of seven such millionaire yearlings in a handful of years.

There’s been the story of Charm Stone (I Am Invincible), now a dual Group 3 winner that was bred, born and sold by Emirates Park, not to mention the farm’s investment into the newest recruit to Yarraman Park, Brave Smash (Jpn).

So the headlines have been good, the results even better, and Emirates Park can say with confidence that it’s doing most things right. It’s not a bad way to head into the spring breeding season, with about 70 mares, give or take, on the books.

“The main thing around all this is that the horses are getting results,” said Bryan Carlson, the operation’s general manager. Speaking to The Thoroughbred Report, he said stories like Charm Stone have been a feather in the farm’s cap.

“Those results have been good news for our buyers too,” he said. “We breed for the sale ring, of course, but we’re also breeding for ourself, so in that respect, it’s been a particularly good run.”

A Charmed family

The Charm Stone story has been a layered delight this year for Emirates Park. Last Saturday at Moonee Valley, the filly kicked clear of the field to land the Listed Atlantic Jewel S., her third stakes victory in just five starts.

Charm Stone belongs to a small syndicate headed by bloodstock agent Sheamus Mills, for it was Mills who bought the filly from Emirates Park at the 2022 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale for $1.55 million. She was a nervous buy at that price, Mills has admitted, but now worth it.

Charm Stone is the third foal from the Northern Meteor mare Najoom. Najoom has quickly established her roots at Emirates Park as one of its blue-blood producers. Along with Charm Stone, she has also foaled the stakes winner Najmaty (I Am Invincible), whom Emirates Park didn’t sell and who has since joined the farm’s broodmare band.

This is as good an emerging family as it gets in Australia. Najoom herself won the G3 Hawkesbury Guineas and G3 Fred Best Classic during her career. All three of her foals to the track so far have been winners, two of them stakes winners, so it’s logical that this family will be carefully bred at Emirates Park.

As such, Najoom is going to Justify this spring after foaling down an I Am Invincible full-sibling to Charm Stone. Her daughter Najmaty will make her stud debut this spring with a booking to Russian Revolution at Newgate, having been retired in January.

Najoom has been an Emirates product since 2013, that year bought by the farm for $225,000 when she was a Willow Park Stud graduate at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale. The mare has had five foals survive, the latest of which is a Capitalist filly, now a yearling. Carlson said they’re undecided about whether she will be retained or sold.

Najoom has an unraced 2-year-old filly that is in work with Peter and Paul Snowden at Randwick. She is by Tassort, a stallion in whom Emirates Park has a significant investment.

“This has obviously been a terrific family for us,” Carlson said. “It’s brought everybody a lot of results. Charm Stone was a filly that I would love to have kept. She was hard to sell because we want to keep these fillies to race, to breed up the families, but we also need to run a business. When it comes down to it, which ones do you keep and which ones do you sell?

“With Charm Stone, it was a pure business decision to sell. We have three or four fillies out of Najoom and we knew how good a filly Charm Stone was, going to the sales. Every year, those sorts of things are part of the balancing act, aren’t they?”

The outcross importance

Japanese-bred Brave Smash is an emerging outcross in Australia, and his breeding is well-aligned with some of the strong stallion values at Emirates Park.

The outcross sire is very important to Carlson. He said Australia is crying out for them, which in part was the motivation to send Najoom to Justify this spring. The farm is also sending its imported mare Red Lodge (USA) (Midshipman {USA}) to the Triple Crown winner, as well as its Golden Slipper winner Mossfun (Mossman).

The bonny Mossfun is already the dam of the Group 3 winner Dajraan (GB), the product of a date with Frankel (GB), and she will first foal to Tassort before heading to Justify at Coolmore. Her daughter, the Fastnet Rock filly Tumooh, is booked to I Am Invincible after a foal by Tassort any day now.

Carlson said one of his major projects at Emirates Park in the next few years is a viable outcross stallion, probably along the Mr Prospector (USA) line. He’s said it many times, that the sire pool in Australia is shrinking and new blood is needed.

“People were saying for a long time that the shuttlers weren’t working,” he said. “But look at what More Than Ready did, look at what Street Cry did and look at Justify now. They’re working. I don’t know why we have this perception that they don’t work because American stallions have done very well here.

“More outcrosses are something we need to look at. There are a lot of good American stallions that would work here if we opened our minds to the idea. They’re tough, they’ve got good bone and they suit our conditions.”

This year, Emirates Park sent its other Golden Slipper winner, Estijaab (Snitzel), to Gun Runner at Three Chimneys Farm in Kentucky. She flew back to Australia and is due a foal any day. The farm also sent its Group-winning mare One More Honey (Onemorenomore), who foaled a Gun Runner filly at Denali Stud, Kentucky, on August 1.

One More Honey will remain in America, this time heading to Into Mischief (USA) at Spendthrift Farm.

“She’s our only one in America at the moment,” Carlson said. “But we’ve also got a couple of mares going to Lope De Vega on Southern Hemisphere time in Europe. We’ve had success with Vega One down here, so we thought it was a good opportunity this year.

“I believe there are quite a few Australians using Gun Runner this year. There’s been a push for him with a Golden Slipper promotion, so I think we’ll find a few more Gun Runners coming down in time. There’s so much opportunity with these American stallions, even with a horse like Munnings.

“I think there are very few stallions coming through in Australia. At under $50,000, we’ve got very limited proven stallions. In America, they might have 30 of those and we’ve probably got 10 or 15.”

In lieu of her Gun Runner foal, Estijaab will go to I Am Invincible. Carlson is unsure if that Gun Runner foal will be retained at this stage, but it’s that old chestnut that every breeder faces with well-bred stock... race them or sell them?

“It will depend on the individual,” he said. “We’ll get to this time next year with the two Gun Runners and we’ll see where they fit. I’d like to send them to the sales, but if it’s a filly out of Estijaab, she’s worth more to be kept, you’d have to say.”

Brave moves

Variously, Emirates Park has stallion investments in Tassort (it owns half of the stallion with Newgate Farm), Dream Ahead (USA) and others. Its investment into Brave Smash with Yarraman Park earlier this year has been a big deal, and the farm is backing it with good mares.

One such booking to the stallion is the Written Tycoon mare Enthaar, who was a winner of the G3 Gimcrack S. and G3 Chairman’s S. at Caulfield. This filly also won the Listed Doveton S. and she’s a homebred for Emirates Park from its Not A Single Doubt mare Final Agreement.

Enthaar had her first foal on August 30, a filly by Tassort, and her booking to Brave Smash is about Emirates Park supporting its new stallion with a well-credentialled pedigree.

“Brave Smash had a great turn of foot when he was racing,” Carlson said. “His temperament and his racing is what I really liked about him, kind of the same with Tassort. They pass those sorts of qualities on to their stock, in my opinion.

“We didn’t breed to Brave Smash early on, but when the opportunity came to buy into him, we jumped on it, and we’re very thankful to Yarraman for allowing us to do that with them.”

Brave Smash finished last season fourth on the Australian first-season sire table, behind only Harry Angel (Ire), Encryption and Justify. It was a robust start from a book he had covered during his time at Aquis in Queensland.

Emirates Park has also committed the mare Shumookh (Dream Ahead {USA}) to the stallion, herself an Emirates homebred and a dual Group 2 winner. Like Enthaar, Shumookh is a young mare with only two foals to her name. She has an I Am Invincible yearling colt, and she dropped a Tassort colt on September 3.

Sires on the way up

Among some of the other matings at Emirates Park this spring, and it’s rich pickings, is the Encosta De Lago mare Salma, who is booked to Extreme Choice. This mare is the dam of the Fastnet Rock performer Hilal, who was so promising as a juvenile when second in all of the G2 Skyline S., G1 ATC Sires’ Produce S. and G1 Champagne S.

Hilal is now a 5-year-old. He won the G2 Stan Fox S. and million-dollar Bondi S., and was placed in such races as the G2 Hobartville S. and G1 Randwick Guineas. He is a half-brother to the Listed winner Salaasel (Fastnet Rock).

His dam, Salma, missed to Extreme Choice last season, but it’s a mating that Emirates Park is keen on. The farm is also sending its dual stakes-winner Liwa (Mulaazem) to the Newgate stallion.

Liwa is a relatively new addition to the Emirates broodmare band, also a homebred and expecting a foal by Tassort at any moment. Her dam, Sboog (Redoute’s Choice), is a half-sister to Rothesay and the dual Listed winner Sensei (Dream Ahead {USA}).

For Emirates Park, supporting the stallions in which they’re invested, but likewise building-up their female families, is a balancing act. The farm is expecting a good number of Tassort foals this spring, for example. It will send 15 mares back to that stallion over the next few months and it has eight of his youngsters in work.

Tassort, a son of Brazen Beau from that outstanding mare Essaouira (Exceed And Excel), will have his first horses to the track this racing year. Feedback has been very positive from trainers and pre-trainers, and among the mares that Emirates Park will send the stallion shortly is the American-bred Okinawa (USA), a daughter of The Factor (USA) who will first foal to Hanseatic.

In addition to these local ranks, Emirates Park will be sending three mares to Rich Hill Stud in New Zealand, two to Proisir and one to Satono Aladdin (Jpn). Among the pair booked to Proisir is Ebhaar, a 4-year-old daughter of I Am Invincible.

This young mare retired from her career late last year. She had won the Listed Merson Cooper S. on debut and another race at Warwick Farm, and she is a granddaughter of that good producer Legally Bay (Snippets). As such, she is closely related to Merchant Navy.

“Proisir is a no-brainer at the moment,” Carlson said. “What he’s done in the last 12 months has been quite exceptional. We highlighted the stallion and decided to send a few mares to him at good value because when these types of stallions pop up, we try to support them.

“Satono Aladdin is another one who looks to have plenty of upside. We’ve sent him a nice one too and we think he’s a stallion on the way up.”

Table: Some of the matings Emirates Park is planning for the 2022 season