Bumps in the road are there to make you fly: Tropicus's path to the top is by no means traditional

Cover image courtesy of The Image Is Everything

When the Anthony and Sam Freedman-trained Tropicus (Too Darn Hot {GB}) stormed to victory in the G1 Oakleigh Plate, it was a valuable upgrade to the 4-year-old entire’s page that validated owner Kia Ora Stud’s opinion that he was a stallion in the making. But it perhaps wasn’t the most straightforward path to that all important Group 1 win.

Good speed from the start

Before Tropicus was the second Group 1 winner from his shuttle sire’s first Southern Hemisphere-bred crop, he took a roundabout route to get to the Freedman father and son training duo’s stables.

The colt is the second named foal out of Group-performed Extensible (Exceed And Excel), a full sister to Listed Belle Of The Turf Stakes victress Cathay Lady and a descendant of a family cultivated by the late His Highness the Aga Khan IV. Ancestress But Lovely (Ire) (Sayajirao {GB}) won the Prix Vanteaux for the Aga Khan IV’s father.

With a strong pedigree behind him, it would not have been hard to place him in the country’s top sales - his brother Penciled (Written Tycoon) had gone to Inglis Easter Round 2 during the lockdowns of 2020.

“He had a setback as a yearling, which was the main reason that he was never sent at auction,” said co-trainer Sam Freedman. “I'm sure he would have been a very popular yearling at any sale if he had gone, because as a type, he's a beautiful horse, but the advice to the breeders was that the setback wouldn’t make him very popular.

“It’s another example of setbacks as yearlings not really affecting the horse as they get older - he's as sound of a horse as we have had, and he’s a hardy, on-pace sprinter as well.”

Tropicus went to leading country trainer Brett Cavanough to be broken in and to undergo the early preparations of his 2-year-old year.

“We got him at the backend of his 2-year-old season,” said Freedman. What the juvenile had shown Cavanough had impressed him.

“Brett had him from when he was a yearling, and he touched base when the horse was coming down and said that he quite liked him. From then, he (Tropicus) was pretty straightforward and everything that we heard from Brett was right, he very much continued in the same manner.”

What the Freedmans saw when Tropicus hit the track impressed them. Connections were happy to remain patient for the juvenile to bloom, and he did in his single start as a 2-year-old, winning at Caulfield in a 1100-metre juvenile dash in May.

“He always showed us plenty, and he trialled well at Flemington and Werribee, so we set him for a city race,” Freedman said. “He always had good speed. We were actually riding him off the pace at the time, which isn’t how he goes best now, and he was excellent at Caulfield at his first time out. He still didn’t know a lot, but he managed to win an open 2-year-old handicap on a Saturday, which is never easy to do at your first start.”

Promise delivered, the Freedmans sent the colt for a break and began plotting an autumn path to the G1 Caulfield Guineas.

Trying to make a miler

The Freedmans are no strangers to a stallion prospect - as an example, former trainee Super Seth, himself a Caulfield Guineas winner, has been in the news as of late over his $70 million move to Coolmore - and once Tropicus ran third in the G3 San Domenico Stakes in his first outing as a 3-year-old, the mile at Caulfield beckoned.

“He ran very well in the San Domenico behind Storm Boy, and he kept on following good horses all the way through his spring preparation,” said Freedman. “He ran good races behind the likes of Broadsiding, Traffic Warden, Private Life - he was in very good company.”

Tropicus was not disgraced in either his G1 Golden Rose Stakes or Guineas runs, but it became abundantly clear that training the colt to sustain a trip wasn’t working.

“At that point, we were trying to make him run a mile, and it wasn’t until we got into the autumn of his 3-year-old year that we really realised he was actually a very good sprinter,” Freedman said.

“Once you are on a path in the spring, it can be very hard to pivot. We were thinking either the Coolmore or the Guineas for him and we became kind of set on going to the Guineas, but at the same time, in the back of our minds we were thinking that he might not be a miler. The tempo was very slow in the Guineas that day and he pulled quite hard, so once we got out of that race, we re-aligned our thinking.

“Then he came second in the Manfred in the autumn - that brought to light the need to keep him fresh and sharp, and we have never looked back since changing the way that we train him. The rest is history.”

Fresh is best

In the autumn, Tropicus returned refreshed in the G3 Manfred Stakes, beaten less than half a length when finishing second, and it was then four weeks into the G3 Zeditave Stakes - back at his favoured track of Caulfield - where the colt really shone to claim his first stakes win, beating Lofty Arch by a length and a half.

“We went fresh into the Zeditave and he was brilliant,” said Freedman. A pattern was starting to emerge, but it wasn’t truly acknowledged until after a run in Morphettville, where the colt struggled with the change in environment.

“We went over to Adelaide and he boiled over a little bit on such a hot today. We sent him for a break, and when he came back in and won the Heath, it started to become a no-brainer to space his runs.”

Tropicus was allowed five weeks and a trial into the G2 Schillaci Stakes, where he was beaten a length by Giga Kick (Scissor Kick). It might not have been victory, but it was validation of the regime.

A four-week break into the G1 VRC Champions Sprint didn’t have quite the desired effect, but Freedman is of the opinion that the straight is not where Tropicus thrives.

“I think he is at his best round a bend,” he said.

The routine for Tropicus between runs is fairly simple; he heads to the water walker for a week or so of low impact conditioning, before returning to Jonathan Munz’s Pinecliff training facility at Mount Eliza to continue his preparation.

“He’s trained out of Pinecliff, which is really laid back,” said Freedman. “He gets a few hours of turnout in the paddock each day and a handwalk and a pick of grass. Fortunately, it is all very easy because he is very quiet. He has a fantastic temperament for an entire, which is also why he has been able to keep on training and performing to the level he has reached.”

Thanks to that temperament, racing’s greatest gear change has never really come up in conversation.

“To give credit to Kia Ora, they have always had a strong belief in the horse,” said Freedman. “If you were doubting him at any point, you were never doubting him because of his attitude. He is always very genuine and he has never behaved like he might need gelding at any point, so it has never really become any sort of discussion.”

Stretching the record

The hope for Freedman and the team after Saturday’s Oakleigh Plate win - carrying the heaviest weight for a winner recorded this century - is that they can bring the horse to the top level again.

The next logical step on the roadmap is the G1 William Reid Stakes, back at Caulfield in a month’s time.

“His record at Caulfield is just terrific, although 1200 metres is a slightly different dynamic for him than 1100 metres,” Freedman said. “But you wouldn’t think it much of a problem after the other day. He was running so strongly through the line. That will be the plan at this stage. We'll give him a little trial and then go to that race in a month's time.”

If the option came up to continue the entire’s preparation into the spring, Freedman would be pleased to see him remain in work.

“As a trainer, you are never keen to see a good horse retire,” he said. “But there is also the commercial reality of him going to stud. It will be up to Kia Ora to make that call, but if he’s racing in good form and with a lot of heart still, we can definitely have that discussion.

“You would imagine he stays in weight-for-age company now, and we wouldn’t rule out a 1000 metres fresh in the spring if he was still in work.”

With that stud berth in wait, Freedman is mindful of creating a strong record to send with Tropicus.

“Given he carried the weight around in good time in the Plate, and with his form as a two and 3-year-old where he was running behind some of the best, I think that will stand him in good stead,” he said. “Admittedly, we trained him to run a mile in the spring of his 3-year-old year, but I think the market will see that once we worked out his trip and the way to train him, we saw the best of him. Hopefully there are more Group 1s in store for him to add to that record.”

Good, tough horses

The Freedman Racing team will be spread across states this weekend with runners aimed at the Sydney juvenile races as well as a host of 3-year-olds and older going around Flemington, but Sam Freedman will carve out some time to attend his local yearling sale at the Oaklands complex in Melbourne.

“We will certainly be active at the sale,” he said. “We always try to buy a few at Inglis Premier - there’s a lot of VOBIS horses which are very attractive to our clients, and we have had a lot of good metropolitan horses purchased at the sale before. The sale has a great record - they’ve sold two or three Everest winners there in recent years.”

For Freedman, the greatest attraction is the style of horse on offer - and not forgetting the pricetag.

“They’re usually a bit more affordable than Magic Millions or Easter,” he said. “And I think from a trainer's perspective, you probably have got more of a trainer's horse to buy, and probably a syndicator's horse as well. There are always really good types on offer who look like they can run

“But at the same time, there's always nice fillies with good pedigrees if you know where to look. We have a very nice 2-year-old filly that Mitch Cunningham purchased out of the Melbourne sale last year that goes quite well, so I think you've got a good balance of good pedigrees and good types as well. It's a good promotion for Victorian breeders that have always bred good, tough horses, so I'm sure they'll be well supported.”

A good, tough horse can come from anywhere, as Tropicus remains living proof, and sometimes the pricetag isn't large either.