Summerfield Hoping for Another Bumper Harvest

[Wandering Eyes]

They carry around a long old surname–it’s Belgian, imported by a grandfather who started out in Louisiana with “five acres and a mule”–but it’s not half as long as their perspective.
Certainly Barbara and Francis Vanlangendonck have been around this business too long to be in any way inflated by their triumph this time last year, when a Curlin colt they presented at the September Sale made $1.8 million. In fact, in returning to Keeneland with no fewer than 51 yearlings in their Summerfield Sales consignment, they don’t even consider that coup the highlight of 2018.

“No, that came at OBS in October,” says Barbara. “Selling a colt for two girls that work for us. One of our clients had given them a mare, and they bred her to Kantharos. The foal was just a stellar animal. Not much pedigree, but Francis got him in front of the right people. The girls said, ‘Well, let’s reserve it for $35,000. Do you think we can get that?’ And he brought $190,000! Changed their world. It was awesome.”

The infectious joy of Elizabeth LaPierre and Jennifer Given that day corroborated the sense of “family” that extends beyond the flesh and blood of the principals and their sons, Arthur and Andrew. As Francis said at the time, they can’t ever pay what they feel their staff are truly worth, so the least they could do is provide some keep for a mare, and a slot in the consignment for the colt.

That experience could only mean as much as it did to people who pursue a precarious calling with due humility. Little wonder, then, if their expectations have not been distorted by a terrific run of results over the last year or so, notwithstanding another big result at Saratoga: a Frosted colt sold for $500,000 on behalf of their Florida neighbors Lori and Tommy Fackler.

“This is a humbling business, we know that,” Barbara says. “We’ve been doing this for a long time. The first sale I worked was 1980, and Francis maybe in ’76. You have some success, and start thinking, ‘Man, I am so smart.’ And God quickly shows you: ‘You know what? You’re not that smart.'”

So the dividends the Vanlangendoncks cherish most are those shared with the clients they cherish, too. Ideally, then, the biggest will also be for the best. The Curlin colt, for instance, was bred and raised at Stonestreet.

“And when you deal with people like that, it’s such a pleasure,” Barbara says. “They’re horsemen, they understand the game. They know things are going to go right, things are going to go wrong, and they’re going to celebrate either way.”

Similarly, with the $1 million American Pharoah colt they sold at Saratoga last year. He was bred by Joanne Nielsen, whose late husband Gerry was as important as anyone in their story. He got Francis started by offering him a partnership in a small Florida farm. Francis retorted that he had $5,000 and a truck, and that was it. So Gerry put up the money for him. They bought 40 acres, then another 40, and continued partnering in mares and so on, for years until Gerry’s death, aged just 69, in 2004.

“Broke my heart, I still miss him,” says Francis. “And of course Joanne’s like my sister, and we kept selling for them, and had some success down the years, and their kids became very good friends too. And then she stepped up and bred [the dam of Upstart] to American Pharoah. And I saw the foal and said: ‘Oh my God, this could be serious.'”

“He looked exactly like his father,” says Barbara.

“Which Baffert denied until after he bought him!” said Francis with a laugh. “It was so exciting, the night of the sale. We all got some ties to wear, and whatnot, and made toasts to Gerry, talking about how much he would enjoy it, and then Gerry Junior comes up in his father’s trademark blue blazer that still had stains on it. And the horse is from a family that he started. It was very emotional, when he made a million: we were all crying, we were hugging, it was good stuff.”

So the Vanlangendoncks understand that a Thoroughbred can win no race as prized as friendship. Take another adored patron who passed away: Richard Eamer of Mandysland Farm, who co-founded National Medical Enterprises in California.

“He was a very poor as a young man,” Barbara recalls. “His girlfriend had to wait tables so they could buy a beer and a pizza to celebrate his 21st birthday. And he became a billionaire. He was so good to me. Our older son was born deaf, and Mr. Eamer sent the jet for us and flew us back to L.A., so that Arthur could be re-evaluated out there; just to make sure we were doing all the right things. Some of the people we’ve worked for have been such a blessing to us.”

All that said, even the most rewarding interactions can only ever be incidental. First and foremost, the Vanlangendoncks have to excel in the service they provide. And while Barbara is a proud Kentuckian, and they have opened a division Bluegrass division to cater to the market there, you can judge their brand from the way she reproves any condescension to their principal address near Ocala.

“I’m as blue as U.K. blue can be,” says this accomplished lady, both an arts major and a veterinary technician. “And Kentucky is the most beautiful place in the world. When I cross the state line, I think, ‘I’m home.’ But let me tell you something about these people down in Florida. They learned this business from the end of a pitchfork. They didn’t learn it because great-granddaddy left them 1,000 acres in Bourbon County. I feel that God placed me down here to realize that there’s good horse people everywhere you go.”

And now something of that same, hands-on culture has filtered down to their sons. Arthur evidently has the kind of preternatural empathy with animals that sometimes accompanies an early sensory impairment, to the extent that his cool, smiling nature is sometimes borrowed by other barns to assist with fiery horses; while Andrew is immersing himself gratefully in the business after 10 years serving with the Air Force.

“It’s really fun to listen to them talk about pedigrees and bloodlines, getting so involved in it all,” says their mother. “Francis and I used to sit out front years ago and just school each other on what works and what hasn’t, and watching them now do the same thing is great.”

Having seen so much of the world beyond, Andrew is palpably enthused by his integration in the business.

“Besides those military principles, like work ethic and integrity, there’s really not much I could take from my old job and put into this,” he says. “So I’m definitely starting from a blank slate. But I’ve been lucky to pull information from so many experienced individuals: I’ve done work for Eddie Woods and Paul Sharp; Nick De Meric [his godfather] has always been a lifeline; while Dad obviously has a wealth of knowledge I can tap into day-to-day. And the grooms, too: after all, they’ve been doing these things for 20 years. Being older, and trying to move forward, it’s a wonderful, eye-opening experience.”

And whatever he has had to learn, some aspects of his military training-discipline, dedication, dependability-can only assist Andrew getting ahead in the business.

“It’s the grind,” he acknowledges. “When you’re deployed, it can get a bit Groundhog Day: it doesn’t matter if you just checked the runway an hour ago, when you have planes loading that cost millions of dollars, you check it again. Same with horses. You can’t come in and try to do everything quickly and then get discouraged when it doesn’t happen. It’s the same horse that has to be brought in every day, and fed and checked and turned back out; the same stalls and shedrow to be swept. Yes, you have to enjoy what you’re doing. But the grind is what gets you there.”

The ultimate military ethic, of course, is teamwork. And that Kantharos colt is by no means the only evidence that the Vanlangendoncks relish sharing opportunity through the ranks.

“We have grooms that bought a filly from us last October for $5,000,” says Francis. “And she sold as a 2-year-old for $150,000. Those guys are living the dream. They’re working the shedrow and grooming and whatnot; they pool the money and buy a horse; and as part of their pay they get to bring her into where they’re working, get her ready, take her to the sale.”

After all, nobody knows better than the Vanlangendoncks that a young, unbroken Thoroughbred can be hard to value. Champion Xtra Heat (Dixieland Heat) arrived as a $9,100 weanling, but even then was sold at a loss as a yearling (for $4,700).
“I think she had a fragment in every joint, and was about the size of a collie dog,” Barbara says. “But I think that’s what keeps us all going: it’s not just a game for rich people. Because let me tell you, if it can go wrong, it’s gone wrong-for everybody. Lightning, van accidents, tornados, you name it.”

“There’s so much luck involved,” agrees Francis. “So all you can ever do is present the horse as well as you can, have a good ethical reputation, and hope for the best.”

“So I think what sets us apart is that we live and die with this business,” says Barbara. “This is 100 percent of our income, right here. There’s no trust fund. When we take a person’s horse into the ring, our attitude is that we own a piece of that horse. And you’d rather own a piece of a horse that makes $100,000 than one that makes $20,000.

“So it’s very personal. One of us is always in the barn. When a buyer comes to our sale barn and asks for three horses, we show them six. We’d say, ‘We know these people, and we know their kind of horse.’ I’ve often heard Francis say in February that he’s going to sell this horse to so-and-so in the fall. And that’s just what he does.”

Five acres and a mule. The principle’s the same, it’s just a question of scale. Neither Francis nor Barbara grew up within this industry. Yet the long and the short of it is that the Vanlangendoncks were born to their vocation.

“We love what we do,” Barbara says. “Somebody said to me once that all these people at Keeneland, if they weren’t selling horses, they’d be out there selling pigs. They would be selling something, because they love that part of it. It’s fun. Especially if you’ve got a good horse.”

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