Respect Helps Queen Keep Her Royal Appointment

[Wandering Eyes]

He recalls it as “a crazy idea” that came to him at Saratoga one summer, nearly a decade ago now. It didn't look too crazy at Royal Ascot last week, when Bill Crager's silks were carried to a flamboyant success by Villanova Queen (Ire) (Mastercraftsman {Ire}). What really is crazy, however, is how obtusely the bloodstock industry in his homeland responded to the sense of adventure quietly animating the attempts of Staghawk Stables to bridge the transatlantic divide.

The inspiration, back in 2014, was to send Jane Buchanan to prospect for yearlings at the Goffs Orby Sale in Ireland. At the time, there wasn't yet the level of American interest that has since developed in the European market. The agent picked out a Dark Angel (Ire) filly from the same branch of the Highclere (GB) dynasty as Deep Impact (Jpn), costing Crager and racing partner Paul Hondros €130,000. Miss Katie Mae (Ire) broke her maiden at the Curragh on her second start, and later shipped to Graham Motion to be beaten a neck in a Listed sprint at Belmont.

As a turf runner with turf blood, however, Crager found that she could not get access to the stallions he wanted to use in Kentucky, even in an era when so many of them corral such huge books. Returned to Europe, in contrast, she has been granted an audience with a series of elite stallions: Kingman (GB), Frankel (GB), Sea The Stars (Ire), Lope De Vega (Ire).

So while Crager emphasizes that his program is modest in both conception and scale, its priorities give rise to important challenges for his compatriots—not least at a time when a congenial racing surface feels so central to the future of the American sport.

Villanova Queen with the Crager Family at Royal Ascot | Bill Crager

“Well, first, we enjoyed turf racing,” says Crager, asked to explain the initial impetus to investment in Europe. “There's the traditional part of the sport that we love. Not the gambling part, not the party part, it's a cultural thing around the horse: respect for the horse, and the way the horse is treated. In Ireland they do a tremendous job; in England, they do a tremendous job. The horse is the center.

“Now, there are challenges in every racing jurisdiction around the world, maybe with the exception of Japan. But at the end of the day, we just respect tradition quite a bit. In the U.S., racing on dirt, there's speed, speed, speed, and we really don't enjoy that as much. We've been successful here on the turf with trainers like Graham Motion and Mark Hennig. We have a few with Riley Mott. But wherever we are, it's the reverence to the horse that is important.”

And it seems that trying to do things right can also get results. This is a program that tries to see the bigger picture, to position itself in a way that can maintain and improve the sport's social traction in the years to come. The partners' children William Crager and Julia Hondros participate in its direction, at 27 and 25 respectively; Riley Mott is another of their generation, as is Phil Hager who has helped to find their horses in that barn; while the involvement of Buchanan and indeed Villanova Queen's trainer Jessica Harrington manifest a determination to correct an appalling gender imbalance in the sport's overall profile.

“It's a tough ceiling to crack, but somebody like Jessica certainly has broken it,” Crager remarks. “Here in the States, we've just seen a female trainer win the Belmont. And what a great story that was, after a Triple Crown season which was not the greatest. The fact that [Jena Antonucci] was able to become the headline story, after all of that, has been phenomenal.

“But it has to change. I mean, it just has to—because this is an inclusive sport, but only at the lowest level. And, to me, you really don't make progress until you get highly visible people. And Jessica is just that, in how successful she is, in that competitive of a racing environment, in the determination and strength she has.”

Harrington has needed all of that in her recent recovery from cancer. And the good news she received on the eve of the meeting made the success of Villanova Queen in the Kensington Palace Fillies' H. all the more special.

Jessica Harrington with Villanova Queen | Bill Crager

“Incredibly so,” says Crager. “She has shown such poise and strength and determination. I cannot tell you how wonderful it was, that last week happened when it did, with all the progress she has made. Because she's just a very special person. Her family–Kate and Emma, and Richie Galway–these are friends, phenomenal people who care so much about the horse and break the mold, in terms of the way things have always been done. To me that that's so important, and not enough of it is happening across the world.”

Villanova Queen has certainly been an exemplary exercise from all concerned. Another Goffs Orby graduate, she was acquired through Ben McElroy for €60,000 from Grove Stud at the 2020 sale.

She broke her maiden on her second juvenile start before finishing well for third in the GIII 1,000 Guineas Trial on her reappearance last year. She was duly fancied to run well in the real thing, but didn't muster the same finish and then disappeared for 11 months.

“She picked up a little injury that day,” Crager explains. “We thought maybe she'd hit the board, but just didn't fire. She's so tough that she didn't really show anything for a week or two, just seemed a little off. We didn't need to do surgery or anything. We just gave her some time and rest and she was able to recover. We're like that, though. I mean, we've never pushed a horse. If you look at the horses we've run, no one gets pushed along too quickly. We just try to be sensible, and we have low expectations. That helps a lot!”

There were signs of a maturing talent in Villanova Queen's three starts this spring: a win at Tipperary and a sneaky-good run at Naas either side of a mud bath. So while she was 25-1 against 18 rivals at Ascot, she circled the field and ran them down in the straight under Colin Keane, deputizing for the injured Shane Foley.

“It was so disappointing for Shane that he couldn't be there, but Colin had ridden our first runner and first winner in Europe, years ago at the Curragh,” Crager says. “And Jessica had given him great direction, which was to get her to the outside because if she has a clear lane, she'll run. I don't think many horses win from that far back, and going that wide, on that course or any other. So it was kind of incredible.”

It will surely be in the back of the team's mind that a filly that can accelerate like that, while rounding a bend on firm ground, might have opportunities on American soil before long.

Will and Bill Crager with Helen of Albany and Miss Katie Mae | Bill Crager

“If she does well, I think that's what we'd like to do,” Crager admits. “But we can't get ahead of ourselves. She has a lot of options. We'll take small steps, try not to overdo it, just see where she takes us. She can probably go longer, as well.”

Vexingly neither of the program principals could be present for the race, and Harrington is now teasing Crager that he should be prohibited from changing their luck by attending in future. As it was, Crager had to settle for yelling at a television in a New York hotel room before a speaking engagement. But for both Crager and Hondros it felt just as important that so many others in their family could be at Ascot, an especially memorable experience for the younger generation. And actually, Crager was able to fly out to London that night, do a little business (he's co-founder of a leading financial technology company) and then head out to the races.

“They all had an incredible time,” Crager reports. “Just an amazing experience. We've been buying in Europe since 2014 with the idea that we'd like to have an Ascot runner, and we kept at it modestly, one or two fillies a year and never breaking the budget. But our pledge was that we weren't going to go [to Ascot] until we had a runner–and there you go. Incredible.”

They won't be getting carried away, mind. They'll stick to the principles that have been working to this point: buying fillies from good families at sensible money, and then entrusting their development to people who set standards for a sport that must remain be viable under the examination of the next generation.

“We approach it pretty conservatively,” Crager stresses. “We're not spending at the top of the market. We're not buying a lot of horses. We try to find the ones that fit our program, and then there'll be 9/10ths disappointments and 1/10th a moment like last week. We're happy just to be closing at the finish. We'll walk away and say, 'Well, that was a really good day: the horse ran well.' So we kind of celebrate things that most people might hang their head on, just because we have reasonable expectations.”

In its temperate way, then, Staghawk are building up a couple of families between mares at Baroda Stud in Ireland, and fillies on the racetrack.

That very first acquisition, Miss Katie Mae, has so far launched only the first foal from those elite covers in Europe: Kingman's daughter Miss Carol Ann (Ire).

“She was named for my mother, and won on debut at Newmarket for Roger Varian,” Crager says. “She then came back and won on July Cup Day, and we were there on the summer course for that. She's with Graham Motion now.”

Lily Crager, Bill Crager, groom and Will Crager with Miss Katie Mae | Bill Crager

Her dam, as already noted, had to return to Europe for her second career after failing to break down grass prejudices in Kentucky. Unfortunately, she lost her Frankel foal, but it has been all quality since and now she's in foal to Blackbeard (Ire), with the idea of brewing up a little extra speed on the page. Hennig meanwhile has a filly by Blackbeard's sire No Nay Never acquired at the breeze-ups in Ireland.

“She's been knocking on the door,” Crager reports. “She's very fast, a thrilling horse to watch, and hopefully we'll see her at Saratoga this summer. We also have a young mare Helen of Albany (Ire) (Exceed And Excel {Aus}). She was with Ger Lyons and very well thought of, but had a wind issue and we could never get her right. So she didn't display her talent on the track.”

Her son by Highland Reel (Ire), with Harrington, is the only colt retained by the program for now: he was not a commercial prospect but can get to work for the page. Helen Of Albany also has a Waldgeist (GB) filly on the ground, and was bred this time to Sioux Nation. There's also a Churchill (Ire) filly in training with Varian, and another by Gleneagles (Ire) still with Richard Brabazon before eventually making her way to Harrington. With Miss Carol Ann and indeed Villanova Queen ultimately destined for the paddocks, then, the broodmare band will quietly continue to evolve.

In the meantime, Staghawk will strive to meet the expectations of a changing world–to which Crager feels the next generation will help to keep their seniors attuned.

“With Riley, we were part of the partnership that gave him his first horses,” he explains. “We're shareholders in Unifying (Union Rags), who got Riley his first win last year, and then his first stakes win a couple of weeks ago. She runs on the dirt. But I just think that the sport has to open up, has to have new energy and new perspectives that generationally bring the sport along to where culture is, and where societal opinion of horseracing can evolve to a better place than it is today. In America, we keep beating our heads against the wall saying, 'Oh, racing has to be fixed' but it gets in its own way in too many ways.

“My son's very involved, has really become very interested in the sport. And he's part of that next generation, connecting Europe and the U.S. to build a modest but thoughtful racing stable. Last week felt like a statement. A small statement: it was the Kensington Palace, a handicap. But we did it, and everyone that you'd speak to in America would like to do it.

“Having being around for a number of years now, you learn the ups and downs, and you roll with them. You're dealing with animals, with competition, with conditions, with weather, with tracks and trips. So much can go for or against you. But when you do get one of those magical days, like last week, it's unlike almost anything else in life.”

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