Unexpected outcomes

Aisling Crowe finds out how the sale of car led to the purchase of a broodmare, the development of a stud farm and the breeding of the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup winner

EACH DECISION has many consequences, some intended but many more unforeseen; how could a person know when they make a simple choice the many consequences of that decision?

When pharmacist James Cloney after a spell in the UK returned to Ireland to work, his job came with a company car so he regarded his own vehicle as surplus to requirements.

He made the decision to sell that car and invest the money instead in a mare in partnership with his brother.

Over a decade later that mare’s son Dream Of Dreams ran third in the Group 1 Diamond Jubilee Stakes and won this yera’s Hungerford Stakes (G2).

She and her offspring have been sold on, but the return on that initial investment allowed Cloney buy and redevelop Clara Stud in Kilkenny, and, more significantly, it provided for the purchase of a Pivotal mare named Entreat.

Now the dam of a Group 1 winner, the Pivotal mare was sold by Cheveley Park Stud to Cloney carrying to Lethal Force. She cost the buyer just 14,000gns and that foal she was carrying is this year’s Group 1 Commonwealth Cup hero Golden Horde.

Cloney and his father-in-law Michael have put together a 16-strong broodmare band on the former show-jumping stud outside Kilkenny, largely through focusing on young mares with back pedigrees laden with blacktype, as he explains.

“The majority of the mares and fillies we bought have really big back pedigrees, looking at their third dams. You have to go back that far when you can’t afford it at the top!

“The majority of the mares and fillies we bought have really big back pedigrees. You have to go back that far when you can’t afford it at the top!

“At least if it’s there in the third dam, or the third dam is working quite well and it’s coming down through different lines of the family, you think there has to be a chance.

“I bought quite a few of those first daughters of first daughters, so their pages looked light on top but there was plenty going on.”

Entreat is a prime example. When Cloney bought her at the Tattersalls 2016 July Sale, she’d had two runners, both placed, and two more to run for her.

Her half-brother Producer had won the Group 2 Topkapi Trophy, the Criterion Stakes and the Supreme Stakes (both G3 events) and a handful of Listed races but that was all the black-type mustered by her dam and siblings.

Entreat’s dam, however, told a much different story. In fact, this article could be taken up with a discussion of the family, such is its merits, but this is a brief resume.

River Saint was a half-sister to the great champion Serena’s Song, who proved herself a top-class broodmare after a championship racing career that saw her inducted into the Hall Of Fame.

Jockey Adam Kirby

Her Storm Cat daughter Sophisticat won the Group 1 Coronation Stakes and Prix Marcel Boussac for the Coolmore partners, while her Listed-winning Mr. Prospector daughter Serena’s Tune has outperformed her siblings, producing the Group 3 Greenham Stakes winner and sire Vocalised for Jim Bolger and she is the second dam of Grade 1 winner and leading young sire Honor Code.

SERENA’S SISTER, as the name implies a full-sister to the champion, has brought the family to the fore in Europe and Australia. Her daughter Princess Serena is the dam of Group 2 winner and Group 1 placed Puissance De Lune, a promising young stallion in Australia, and the Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan winner Zabeel Prince. She is also the second dam of Rizeena, successful in the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes.

“Entreat has a real champion’s back pedigree, a lot of different lines are working in different angles down through it,” says Cloney. “When I bought her, my main thing was that she looks an exposed mare, but she was not really because she had four Dutch Art coverings and only two had run.

“I thought she has only been exposed to one stallion really, and at the same time Lethal Force wasn’t very popular, but I think he is not a bad stallion in any shape or means and I was willing to take a chance. If they have too obvious of a covering, we can’t buy them so you have to take a chance on it.”

Entreat is a typical Pivotal mare, almost a replica of her sire and she throws strong, attractive foals in that mode.

At GoffsUK Premier Yearling Sale in 2018, he made £65,000 to trainer Clive Cox, and Cloney returned to Kilkenny nursing hopes for the year-younger Mehmas half-brother he had at home.

A year later, and back at Doncaster with that colt, those hopes were now real with bold black-type updates on the page – Golden Horde had won the Group 2 Richmond Stakes and had just run third to Earthlight in the Group 1 Prix Morny.

Under the Highclere Stud draft – Paddy Kelly who helps Cloney and his father-in-law on the farm and preps the sales horses, works for Highclere Stud – Entreat’s yearling Mehmas colt made £265,000 to Oliver St Lawrence and ended 2019 as the most expensive yearling from the first crop of his sire.

Now named Line Of Departure and in training with Roger Varian at the time of writing, he is already a dual winner.

When their Zoffany half-sister sells at Tattersalls Book 1 in October, the page that was very light on top now looks very different. It now shows a Group 1 winner and the Listed winner Exhort, as well as winners Line Of Departure and Plead, and Entreat can now boast being the dam of four winners from five runners.

Of the decision to sell Entreat’s yearling daughter at Tattersalls, Cloney says: “The Zoffany filly is our first to sell in Book 1.

“We could have gone anywhere with her really, but it’s not too often that you get a horse that can go to that sale.

“Line Of Departure has won twice now and I think there is a lot of potential in him. Golden Horde’s run in the July Cup showed he is a proper Group 1 horse and, personally,

I think a bit faster ground would have suited him.

“I’ve covered at least one mare a year with Zoffany for the last few seasons. I’d be excited about this filly, she has more of a classy appeal about her and I think she could be the true miler out of the family.

“I think that was the nice thing that Zoffany could bring to the mare, that miler class to the mare.

“I think that’s what will have greater appeal. If you race a filly you want something that you can breed out of and I think that

Zoffany will be a broodmare sire, you have it all there, and I think that is where I see the filly appealing to as, without even racing a step, she has a huge broodmare career.”

Entreat has a filly foal from the first northern-hemisphere crop of Australian sensation Zoustar, and was amongst the elite book of mares that Blue Point covered at Kildangan Stud last spring.

“From the foals I have seen Entreat has this natural gift to produce stunning stock and we are very excited about Zoustar, there’s an interesting pedigree behind the stallion, he was a top class juvenile and he has broken every record down under,” says Cloney.

“If you go back to it where do you get the opportunity to use a proven, but still a firstseason sire?

“Nothing had happened in the pedigree at the time, but I thought it was the right thing to do.

“She is now the dam of a Royal Ascot Group 1 winner and Blue Point is a Royal Ascot Group 1 winner so if there is ever a horse bred for the Commonwealth Cup this is him or her,” he laughs.

The Clara Stud, Paddy Kelly and Highclere Stud team will have a representative at GoffsUK’s Premier Yearling Sale this year, a Starspangledbanner colt and a first foal of the New Approach mare Appreciating. She was bred by HM The Queen out of Star Value, a gift from HH The Aga Khan as a Danehill Dancer daughter of Group 1 Prix de Diane winner Shemaka.

That makes the strong and masculine chestnut inbred 3x3 to Danehill Dancer and, despite there being no familial relationship, all concerned remark on the physical resemblance between this yearling and that of a famous previous occupant of his stable.

“He is a very similar build to Golden Horde as a yearling; a big, strong belter of a colt so we are looking forward to selling him,” it’s a view held by Kelly, who expresses it later as he shows the colt in the strong August sun.

“It looks quite light on the page because she was unraced – we bought her as a twoyear-old and brought her back here to rehab her, sent her into training with Kevin Ryan.

“He was adamant that she was a cracking good filly only the injury wouldn’t hold up, he thought she had loads of ability if he could get her to the track sound but unfortunately that didn’t happen.

“The good thing about that is it gives you the confidence to cover her well; she’s a New Approach mare so we sent her to Starspangledbanner.

“Nothing has really happened yet in the family, Appreciating’s dam has only had one runner but he was rated in the 80s and it looks light because this is the first foal but that can mature out,” explains Cloney.

WHEN CLONEY assesses a mare she has to be a daughter of a stallion that either excels as a broodmare sire or has the potential to do so in the future. The stock each mare produces have to be horses that Cloney would be willing to race himself and, especially with fillies, the identity of their dam-sire is vital.

Entreat is a daughter of Pivotal, Appreciating is by New Approach, who is the broodmare sire of Golden Horde’s old foe Earthlight, while the third yearling that Cloney offers for sale this year, a Mastercraftsman filly in Book 2, is out of the Giant’s Causeway mare Il Palazzo.

Her first foal is the stakes winner Still Standing (Mastercraftsman), and won the Listed Devoy Stakes over 1m2f last season for Jessica Harrington.

The dam follows Cloney’s formula – her dam is a half-sister to Grade 1 Clement L Hirsch Turf Championship winner Senure out of Diese, winner of the Group 3 Prix Corrida.

“Entreat has this natural gift to produce stunning stock and we are very excited about Zoustar, there’s an interesting pedigree behind the stallion

She is a half-sister to the Group 1 winner and sire Xaar out of Monroe so it is that branch of Best In Show’s family, with Cityscape, Bated Brath, Logician and a host of other top-class performers.

“Trying to get a nice broodmare sire, or potential broodmare sire is very important, too,”says Cloney. “Il Palazzo is a Giant’s Causeway mare, third dam is Monroe and every foal she throws is much bigger and stronger than her. “It’s eye-opening when you see the stock, it’s really not about what the dam looks like, it’s about what she can produce and she really produces lovely foals.” When James Cloney made that decision to sell his car and buy a mare with his brother, Golden Horde was the unforeseen consequence.

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to say now that it was, most definitely, the right decision.

Line Of Departure