I believe Dubai Millennium started at £100,000 but I suspect a lot of the mares were ultimately foal shares due to his death during his first season at stud, so how many actually paid that, I have no idea.Northport wrote: ↑Sun Oct 16, 2022 10:44 pmAs the original asker of the question… im going to say nah European horses don’t really count. The Guineas and Derby are definitely important and stallion making races, though the Derby is starting to wane, but the St Leger almost devalues any flat stallion prospects. If you want to charge over $100,000, the English Triple Crown would have to be on the line in order to bother running your colt. We also cant really hold it against any of them that they hardly ever win the BCC. They are almost all bred to run on grass, at least in their close up pedigrees.Miss Woodford wrote: ↑Sun Oct 16, 2022 9:17 pmDo European horses count? Frankel started at £125k and Giant's Causeway (who meets the criteria for not winning a classic race nor a Breeders Cup race) at IR£ 100k.Flanders wrote: ↑Sun Oct 16, 2022 8:02 pm
I'm going with never.
I've been trying to come up with a list of horses that were even retired to a stud fee of 100k+. Its pretty rare, obviously the 2 Triple Crown winners. Before that I can only come up with Ghostzapper in 2006, Smarty Jones in 2005, Empire Maker in 2004, Point Given in 2002, and Fusaichi Pegasus in 2001. The only one I can come up with in the 90s was, I *think* Easy Goer started at 100k in 1991. Before that, no clue. Obviously I might be forgetting someone. I almost forgot to put Empire Maker on the list.
They do have a big finale race like the Arc (and to a much lesser extent, the Champion Stakes), so you can see how that would add a boost I guess. Though even a phenom like Sea the Stars only started out at €85,000.
If we did include Euros though, Giant’s Causeway would fit the bill I suppose, but barely. Poor guy was 2nd in two different Guineas and the BCC, but won literally everything else. Frankel won the English 2,000 Guineas, so he wouldn’t count.
But he never won a classic - 9th in the Derby and didn’t run in the Guineas or St Leger. In many ways I think he marked a turning point in TB breeding here: no Derby, no ‘Arc, no King George…