by Chris McGrath, TDN Headline News, Nov 4, 2021
Once again, the Breeders’ Cup reminds us how our whole business hinges on a delicate equilibrium. On the one hand, we need the kind of big plays made on barnmates Gamine (Into Mischief) and Corniche (Quality Road), who changed hands for $1.8 million and $1.5 million respectively, to come off sufficiently to keep the big spenders in the game. But we also need those Goliaths to be humbled, from time to time, by a little guy with a sling.
A still more uncomfortable challenge, however, is offered to those talent spotters who spend big for wealthy patrons. How few of those guys stick around for the dregs of a sale, ready to back their judgement on a diamond in the rough. You might attribute that to a want of diligence or patience. But I would sooner put it down to a want of nerve. Arguably it takes more courage, more self-belief, to offer a tycoon a cheap horse from the second week of the September sale than it does to buy a seven-figure knockout in Book I.
That’s why I doff my cap to the man who bought Gamine, Donato Lanni. He has deservedly assembled some pretty powerful clients over the years, having applied lore absorbed from John T.L. Jones to long associations with John Sikura and lately Bob Baffert, his resume decorated by three winners of the Breeders’ Cup Classic in Authentic (Into Mischief), Arrogate (Unbridled’s Song) and Bayern (Offlee Wild). But the man who bought Gamine can also be credited with one of the great bargains in this year’s Breeders’ Cup cast, GI Maker’s Mark Filly and Mare Turf favorite War Like Goddess (English Channel). Aptly enough, he bought this filly – for $30,000 at OBS June – for the client who got him started, George Krikorian, who allowed Lanni to roll the dice on a $35,000 yearling filly by Dynaformer in 1999. She became millionaire and multiple Grade I winner Starrer; and War Like Goddess is threatening to bring things full circle, having won for the sixth time in seven starts on her Grade I debut in the Flower Bowl S.
This is one of those horses that have left a bunch of people standing on the riverbank, looking forlornly at the vacant hook at the end of their line and lamenting the one that got away. Bred by Calumet, home to her chronically undervalued sire, she was first sold as a weanling for just $1,200 deep in the Keeneland November Sale of 2017 to Falcon L&L Stables / Lawrence Hobson. She was offered in the same ring the following September but was sent back as a $1,000 RNA, and resurfaced at OBS June for Hemingway Racing & Training Stable, breezing in :10 2/5. Step forward Lanni, with HND Bloodstock, to improve her value to $30,000.
The agent has described his curiosity on finding this “big, lanky” staying type in a sale like this. He felt she just needed time–and an owner who would give her just that. Krikorian was the very man, and Bill Mott the trainer to match. Sure enough, War Like Goddess did not resurface until September the following year, but she has barely looked back since.
There will be people similarly reproaching themselves over the odyssey of her dam, Misty North (North Light {Ire}), winner of a maiden claimer at Golden Gate Fields in 11 starts for breeder Judy B. Hicks after being retained as a $10,000 yearling. Calumet picked her up for $30,000 on retirement, carrying a first foal by Cape Blanco (Ire) who never made the track, and covered her with Red Rocks (Ire). The resulting yearling made just $2,000 before winning a series of claimers, but her next foal is War Like Goddess, who remained unraced when Calumet culled Misty North carrying a Bal a Bali (Brz) colt at the Keeneland November Sale two years ago. (They had tried to do so at the same auction the previous year, but she failed to generate a single bid.) Misty North–who was still only nine–was bought for $1,000 by Charles Yochum, who took her home to his ranch in Texas.
The other investor who has doubtless followed the rise of War Like Goddess with astonishment is Matt Ferris, who purchased Misty North’s weanling filly by Red Rocks for $5,000 in the same catalog. However those particular investments have played out, now that they respectively concern the dam and half-sister of a Breeders’ Cup favorite, they reiterate our opening premise. We all need to feel we have a shot.
In view of the family’s commercial struggles to this point, it’s worth raising a couple points about the things missed by everybody bar Lanni…