Pedigree Insights: Nonza

[Wandering Eyes]

I’m not sure exactly what a stallion needs to achieve to merit the title “sire of sires,” but surely the two-time champion sire Smart Strike already qualifies. We’ve seen his son Curlin do so well that his fee has risen to $150,000, with the escalation being fuelled by the Grade I successes of Exaggerator, Palace Malice, Stellar Wind, Keen Ice, Curlina, Off The Tracks, Connect and Good Magic. The last-named has added this year’s GI Haskell Invitational to his GI Breeders’ Cup Juvenile victory.

Then there’s the underrated English Channel, who stood the latest season at $25,000, even though his total of Grade I winners now stands at seven, just one short of Curlin’s figure. The bias against him no doubt stems from the fact that turf has been the preferred surface for so many of his best winners, including The Pizza Man and this year’s Grade I scorers Heart To Heart and Voodoo Song.

Another with a Grade I winner to his credit is the California-based Square Eddie, whose stallion career has been unconventional in that he won as a 5-year-old in 2011, having covered his first mares in 2010. That hasn’t stopped him siring the GI Hopeful S. winner Ralis and a healthy percentage of black-type winners from his early crops, none of which numbered more than 32 named foals. With his fee raised to $25,000 in 2016, there must be a good chance that Square Eddie’s 2017 crop is not only his biggest (at 44 live foals) but also his best.

Last weekend also showed Smart Strike’s stallion sons in a good light, with two of them scoring a top-level double in California and France.

Firstly we saw Lookin At Lucky’s son Accelerate add the GI Pacific Classic to his earlier Grade I wins in the Santa Anita H. and the Gold Cup At Santa Anita (in which he was chased home by Dr Dorr, another of Lookin At Lucky’s sons). Accelerate’s wide-margin win at Del Mar earned him a Racing Post rating of 128, the best achieved by a dirt horse this year–and that includes Gun Runner (127), Justify (126) and Thunder Snow (123). With his only setback in five races this year being a narrow defeat under top weight in the Oaklawn H. back in April, Accelerate is very much the poster boy for his sire.

While Lookin At Lucky now commands a fee of $17,500–half his original price–it may not be too late for this champion 2-year-old and GI Preakness S. winner to become as reliable at stud as he was on the racetrack. He is also having an excellent time with his Chilean progeny, such as Dafonda, El Picaro and Wow Cat.

Accelerate’s victory in the Pacific Classic was widely expected, at odds of 2-5, but anyone who backed Zanzibari’s progressive daughter Nonza in the G1 Prix Jean Romanet was rewarded at odds of 11-1.

Zanzibari isn’t a familiar name outside France, but he was a talented member of the same 2007 crop by Smart Strike as Lookin At Lucky. If anything, Zanzibari was even more precocious than Lookin At Lucky. Andre Fabre had him ready to make his debut in late-May, when he won a five-furlong newcomers’ event at Maisons-Laffitte in the colors of Sheikh Mohammed. Narrowly beaten next time out, Zanzibari graduated to group company on his third appearance, when he stayed on well to take the G3 Prix de Cabourg at Deauville. Although he had only four opponents, the fillies which finished second and third both went on to become Group 3 winners.

The next step for Zanzibari was the G1 Prix Morny–a particularly hot edition which featured the future Classic winners Special Duty and Canford Cliffs. Although Zanzibari finished last of five, he was beaten only a length, so was far from disgraced. The possibility exists that all was not well with him, as he never raced again, and he was priced at only €1,000 when he began his stallion career at Haras du Mesnil in 2011.

The Devin family’s Haras du Mesnil had established its reputation by standing the break-out stallion Kaldounevees. Although Kaldounevees never won anything more important than a pair of Group 3 events over a mile, he was a very creditable second at Group 1 level in Germany and the U.S. (in the Man o’War S.). His lack of a Group 1 success was reflected in his modest fee of 15,000 francs when he retired to Henri and Antonia Devin’s stud. Even so, his first five crops were small but that began to change thanks to two of the Devins’ homebreds.

Kaldounevees’s first crop was headed by Terre A Terre, a tough filly who improved with age. A listed winner at three, she hit a rich vein of form in the second half of her 4-year-old season, notably winning the G1 Prix de l’Opera over a mile and a quarter prior to being beaten only a head and a neck against the males in the G1 Hong Kong Vase. She then defeated the very smart Noverre to take the G1 Dubai Duty Free over a distance just short of a mile and an eighth at Nad Al Sheba on her only appearance at five. Sadly Terre A Terre was to die as a 7-year-old after producing just one foal–the group-placed Terra Incognito.

Kaldounevees second crop also contained a star in the Devin-bred Ange Gabriel. Another who improved with age, Ange Gabriel shone as a 4-year-old, when he won the G1 Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud and G1 Hong Kong Vase. Three more Group successes followed at five, including a repeat win in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud. Ange Gabriel retired to Haras du Mesnil but failed to replicate Kaldounevees’s success.

Fortunately that wasn’t the end of the Devins’ successful association with Kaldounevees’s progeny. Terre A Terre’s dam, the six-furlong winner Toujours Juste, produced a total of seven foals by Kaldounevees, of which Terre A Terre was the first and the best. Six of them were fillies, the only male being Kachgai, a talented and versatile performer who won in France and the UAE.

Terre A Terre’s sister Terra Alta showed only a little ability in two starts but she has made ample amends by producing Nonza as her second foal. With a May birthday, Nonza has been given plenty of time by her connections. Unraced at two, she made a winning debut at Chateaubriant. It wasn’t until her third start as a 4-year-old that she was promoted to black-type company and she graduated in good style, winning a listed race at Maisons-Laffitte to maintain her unbeaten record as a 4-year-old. Now she has become a Group 1 winner at the first attempt and has won five of her seven starts.

Nonza follows the Group 3 winner Baghadur as only the second group winner from the first five crops by Zanzibari. Baghadur went on to show smart form at Group 1 level in Hong Kong under the name Joyful Trinity. Now resident at Haras de Grandcamp, Zanzibari has been busier in recent years, for example covering 96 mares in 2016. He is still only an 11-year-old, so could easily add further to Smart Strike’s story as a sire of sires.

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