Matings Mix: Riversdale monitoring the market when making decisions

Cover image courtesy of Riversdale Farm

Located just outside Scone in the Hunter Valley, Riversdale Farm has been in Nick Hodges’ family for over 35 years. The pastures that raised Group 1 winners Samadoubt (Not A Single Doubt) and Nettoyer (Sebring) recently turned out a new star in G3 Quezette Stakes victress Ferivia (Astern), and Hodges hopes to replicate the same homegrown success for his clients and personal broodmare band with this season’s matings.

Managing the cycle

On a smaller scale operation than some of the valley’s giants, Hodges explained that sometimes the sky is not the limit with fees, and that cost has to play an important role in deciding where a mare goes, either for himself or for clients.

“I spend a lot of time doing the matings,” he said. “You've got to factor in the whole big picture. Price point is always something that you've got to consider.”

It’s not the be-all, end-all though, and there is potentially value to be had when a stallion is less popular with the market.

“You also have to look at where a stallion is at in his career cycle,” Hodges said. “That’s in terms of what books he has been serving in the past, the quality and size of those books of mares that he will have coming through at the sales and on the track.

“I had very good success with Exceed And Excel commercially back in the day - all I could do with him was a foal share, and his career was quite cyclic for a long time, with his runners and appearing to be commercial. When he was having success on the track, everyone had piled into him, and his price would go up or his bookings would be difficult to get in.

“Then he would go through a bit of a lull on the track and the market would ease off him a little bit, and that’s when I would get my foal share. So when I was selling that foal, it was off the back of previous good books he had had that were then racing successfully as 2-year-olds, and the cycle continued. I did that about three times with Exceed And Excel with success.

“Some stallions aren’t like that, and aren’t influenced by mare quality as much. I hung off with I Am Invincible, waiting for him to do the same thing, and he never did!”

Proven sires kick off Meryl’s sisters

Another stakes-winning graduate is dual Group 3 winner Meryl (Epaulette), who was bred by Hodges himself and is now herself the producer of a stakes winner after her son Media World (Written Tycoon) won the G3 Hawkesbury Guineas in May. Hodges has retained two half-sisters of the mare, Kimura (Star Witness) and Anne (Shalaa {Ire}), to carry on the bloodline on the farm. Their dam Academy Idol (Made Of Gold {USA}) was a full sister to G3 Gilgai Stakes winner Cosmic Strike.

“We raced Kimura with Michael Freedman,” Hodges said. “She actually won her maiden, then won a Class 1 at her next start, and then she ran into a lot of wet tracks, which she didn’t really like. She only won the two races, but she had quite a bit of talent, so we sent her to Maurice last year and has had a cracking colt foal. We’re really pleased with the result.”

For her second season at stud, Kimura visits Maurice’s (Jpn) barnmate at Arrowfield Stud, Castelvecchio, who saw his fee lift to $49,500 (inc GST) after a breakout season with six stakes winners, including the Group 1 winners Aeliana (NZ) and El Castello. Aeliana’s damsire is also Star Witness, and the only runner bred to date from Dundeel (NZ) over Star Witness mares is a winner already.

“With young mares, I like to try and stick as much as possible to proven sires for their first couple of foals,” Hodges said. “Her pedigree mates up really well with both Maurice and Castelvecchio. I’m a big fan of Maurice, he’s done a fantastic job with what he has covered and he has got some really good books of mares coming along, so I see him having the potential to really hit his straps in the next couple of years.”

Hodges has had to learn what works with Maurice before sending mares his way.

“Type is a big thing with stallions, they have to suit your mare,” he said. “The type can vary and they don’t always throw the same type as what they are. Once you get a line on what a stallion can produce, you might adjust your breeding ideas to account for that. Maurice is a big, strong stallion, but I know now to give him a bigger mare.”

Anne, on the other hand, is entering stud this spring, and is bound for a date with Vinery Stud’s All Too Hard, whose fee has been trimmed to $27,500 (inc GST) despite another solid season of 100 individual winners and five stakes winners in Australia.

“She needs good substance, and I want to send her somewhere that’s proven,” Hodges said. The price point is also attractive, given the stallion's consistent results. “You don’t want to go too much on a first foal either.”

Aviemore comes home

The winner of three of her first four starts, Aviemore (Written Tycoon) has had a homecoming of sorts at Riversdale this year.

“We bought her up at the Magic Millions this year in foal to Ozzmosis, and she’s due in a week,” Hodges said. Riversdale and Lindeman Lodge spent $70,000 on the mare at this year’s Magic Millions Gold Coast National Broodmare Sale, where she was offered by the Newgate Consignment. But it was far from her first time on the Gold Coast.

“She was actually a mare that we sold in foal to Street Boss a few years ago," Hodges said. "We sold her for a client, and since we really liked her, when she came up for sale from China Horse Club in foal to Ozzmosis, we bought her back with different clients.”

In 2022, Aviemore had gone through the same ring and commanded $380,000 at the fall of the hammer. Her now 3-year-old Madam Moneybags (Street Boss {USA}), who was in utero at the time, won her first trial in May by five and a half lengths, and is yet to debut.

It’s easy to see why Aviemore would have commanded such a hefty price tag in the first place; she is a half-sister to multiple stakes winner King Of Sparta (I Am Invincible) out of the Group 3 winner Octavia (Holy Roman Emperor {Ire}). After the mare lost her I Am Invincible foal in 2024, Hodges is hopeful for smoother sailing this spring before she visits Darley shuttler Harry Angel (Ire).

“He’s (Harry Angel) going really well,” Hodges said. The Group 1-producing sire's fee rises to a career best $66,000 (inc GST) for this season. “It’s good to have a Harry Angel to sell out of another mare this year.”

Stakes performers upgrading their dams

You Wahng (So You Think {NZ}) put on a striking performance to take out the G1 Queensland Oaks over the winter, and her performance has earned her dam Wahng Wah (Casino Prince) a booking to the country’s reigning Champion Sire, Zoustar.

Owned by Wall Street Thoroughbreds, Wahng Wah has also produced the Listed winner Street Gossip (So You Think {NZ}), and was not served last spring after foaling a full brother to her two stakes winners. Another daughter, So Newchee Thinks (So You Think {NZ}), is in foal to Starspangledbanner for her maiden season.

“She (Wahng Wah) will go to Zoustar this year off the back of You Wahng’s Oaks win,” Hodges said. “She’s a nice, tight style of mare that will really suit Zoustar. She’s a very neat sort of mare.”

Close relation Promenades (Lonhro) also benefits from the pedigree boost and is going to The Autumn Sun, who makes his much anticipated return to the breeding barn this year after missing a season due to injury. Sons of Redoute's Choice over Lonhro mares have a tidy strike rate of 64% winners to runners, with the cross producing Group 1-winning juvenile Return To Conquer (Snitzel) and recent G3 Bletchingly Stakes winners Bridal Waltz (Snitzel).

“She’s a lovely Lonhro mare out of Movin’ Out,” Hodges said. “So she’s out of the same family as You Wahng, through the second dam (Twyla). It’s nice to have more access to horses of that line.”

You Wahng’s third dam Celebria (Peintre Celebre {USA}) is a daughter of influential broodmare Twyla (Danehill {USA}), who has three other Group 1-winning descendants including Tom Kitten (Harry Angel {Ire}).

Repeating the formula

Another mare who has earned an upgrade - or rather, a return - to Kia Ora Stud’s Farnan is Dixie Chick (Star Witness), whose son Nashville Jack (Farnan) was an impressive Saturday winner at the start of this preparation, before rallying through a Heavy 10 track at Rosehill to come fourth in the Listed Rosebud two and a half weeks ago.

“She’s going back off of the strength of Nashville Jack,” Hodges said, sharing that the mare had visited Farnan on Tuesday afternoon after foaling a So You Think (NZ) filly in early August.

“The people who own him (Nashville Jack) thought highly enough of him to buy the half-brother by Snitzel at the Inglis Easter Sale this year, which I think was a very good buy. He was a lovely, lovely horse, and they didn't overpay for him.”

Mulberry Racing, for whom Brad Widdup trains Nashville Jack, bought Dixie Chick’s son of Snitzel for $300,000 at this year’s Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale.

Of the Farnan colt - who cost Mulberry and Widdup $225,000 at the previous year's Easter sale - Hodges was certain he had reasonable excuses for his difficult runs in both the Rosebud and, earlier in the year, in the G3 Black Opal Stakes as a juvenile.

“His shoe came off (during the race) and went through the bottom of his foot,” Hodges explained. The colt still finished fifth by only just over two lengths to King Of Pop (Farnan). “They (the owners) were super impressed with the effort, considering what he did to himself in the running.”

Nashville Jack is due to trial on Thursday, with connections hopeful of a tilt at the G1 Golden Rose Stakes later this month. If we get to see the best of him this spring, Hodges may soon have another stakes winner to credit to Riversdale's name.