Stallion Profile January 2003

Universal Prince

Class and courage were his hallmarks

WINNING one Gr.1 is hard enough, winning four is a sure sign of class and courage, qualities Universal Prince had in spades. Retiring to Inverness Stud for the 2003 season, the AJC Derby winner is the subject of this month’s stallion profile by DAVID BAY.

  THERE were few more courageous or high class performers in the past couple of seasons than Universal Prince who begins his stud career in 2003 at Inverness Stud, Bowral.

  Retired as the winner of seven races and almost $3m, four of them Gr.1 events, he looks set to follow the pattern established by his classic-winning, three-quarter brother Blevic, now a sire success in South Australia. Blevic’s runners include Blevvo, winner of the WATC Fruit ’n’ Veg Stakes-Gr.1 (1800m) on December 7, his sixth win in succession.

  This story really begins with the importation of their sire Scenic (IRE) (Sadler’s Wells-Idyllic by Foolish Pleasure) who arrived in the same shuttle ‘draft’ as Danehill (USA) in 1990.

  Scenic dead-heated for first in the Dewhurst Stakes-Gr.1 (with ill-fated Price of Dance, also from the first crop of Sadler’s Wells) over 7f at two and trained on the following season to land the William Hill Scottish Classic-Gr.3 (10f) and place in the St James’s Palace Stakes-Gr.1 over 8f at Royal Ascot.

  Surprisingly, when you consider his breeding, 10f (2000m) was about as far as Scenic wanted to go and many of his runners here are really good milers.

  Scenic’s career tends to be discounted a little because of the enormous and immediate impact Danehill had on the Australian (and later world) breeding scene, and for the fact that Scenic wasn’t nearly as successful with his northern crops - he stopped shuttling pretty quickly - but Scenic has winners approaching $A40m and 37 stakes winners - eight of them at Gr.1 level. By any criteria, he is a very good sire. Scenic stood for Lindsay Park, then Collingrove in NSW and Victoria before his sale to Durham Lodge in WA in 1998, a year when his stock really hit their straps and he finished third behind Zabeel and Danehill in the Leading Sires’ Premiership with 85 winners of 167 races and $3.8m.

  The following season (1999-2000) he was fourth behind Danehill, Snippets and Danzero with 90 winners of 175 races and $3.6m, and in 2000-2001 he was runner-up to Danehill with 96 winners of 191 races and $5.57m. He made the top five again last season with 78 winners of 126 races and $4.12m and an Average Earnings Index of 2.55. He was also fifth Leading Sire by Winners (78) and runner-up (less than $100,000) behind Royal Academy on the list of Leading Active Stallions in Australia.

  Scenic was back in Victoria this season, at Collingrove, Nagambie where he commanded a fee of $22,000 and was quickly book full. His latest Gr.1 winner is Scenic Peak, who scored a record-breaking win in the Emirates Stakes (1:33.49 for 1600m) during the Melbourne Cup Carnival. Like so many of Scenic’s better runners, Scenic Peak’s damline features Star Kingdom, this time in the shape of his dam Chesapeake, by Marscay. Scenic’s female line is a high class one, his dam’s 10 winners include Cupid and Ithaki, both runners-up in Gr.1 events, and Scenic’s sister Well Away is dam of Gr.2 winner and dual Gr.1 runner-up Endless Summer.

  Idyllic is a daughter of English Oaks winner Where You Lead (Raise a Native-Noblesse by Mossborough) and a half-sister to the stakeswinning dams of Rainbow Quest (Gr.1 winner and sire), Commander in Chief (English Derby, sire) and Warning (Gr.1 winner and sire).

  This close relationship to several high class sires gives breeders lots of opportunities to double up on one of the world’s best families, for example, by using daughters of horses like Quest for Fame (Rainbow Quest), Charnwood Forest (Warning) or Spectrum (Rainbow Quest) with Universal Prince.

  Scenic’s sire Sadler’s Wells (Northern Dancer-Fairy Bridge by Bold Reason) is also from a prolific family, his dam Fairy Bridge (Bold Reason-Special by Forli) is a half-sister to Nureyev and is the dam of Fairy King and Tate Gallery (brothers to Sadler’s Wells) and Perugino (a Danzig three-quarter brother). It’s also the family of Thatch, Geiger Counter and Yeats among others, providing even further opportunites for Universal Prince.

  Sadler’s Wells was easily his dam’s best performer on track. Bred by a Coolmore partnership that included Robert Sangster (also breeder of Universal Prince and Blevic), he won both his starts at two (including a Gr.2) by six lengths and resumed at three with a second to stable companion El Gran Senor in the Gladness Stakes. Next came the Irish Derby Trial (10f) before a drop in distance to the Irish 2000 Guineas, a race he won from Procida and subsequent English Derby winner Secreto.

  Next came the French Derby, where he was beaten a length by Darshaan (whose bloodlines, and those of his sire Shirley Heights and grandsire Mill Reef have created a tremendous nick with Sadler’s Wells these days), then he gave a great display of his courage and acceleration in landing the Eclipse Stakes-Gr.1 (from Time Charter and Morcon) before a second to the front-running Teenoso in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes.

  After finishing out of contention in the Benson and Hedges Gold Cup, he collected his third Gr.1 in the Phoenix Champion Stakes, beating Seattle Song and Princess Pati before his swansong, an unplaced run behind Sagace in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.

  With more than 200 stakes winners, at least 55 Gr.1 winners and having just collected his 12th title as the Champion GB Sire, Sadler’s Wells has proved one of the great sires in thoroughbred history with runners like the past two English Derby winners Galileo and High Chaparral, Arc winners like Montjeu and Carnegie, English Oaks/Irish Derby winner Salsabil, Breeders’ Cup Turf winners In the Wings (sire of Singspiel) and Northern Spur and Gr.1 winners like Imagine, Gossamer, Barathea, Milan, Ballingarry, Aristotle and Kayf Tara, it’s no wonder that his dynasty is spreading worldwide. Apart from Scenic, we have seen sons like Carnegie (Amalfi, Carnegie Express), Victory Dance (Cinda Bella, Victory Smile), Barathea (Easy Rocking) sire Gr.1 winners in Australasia.

  Universal Prince, bred by a partnership of Sangster and David Hayes, was the second foal of his dam Biscay Bird (Bluebird (USA)-Blooms by Biscay). A winner at 1600m, Biscay Bird is a half-sister to Blevic (eight wins and $1.3m 1200m-2500m), a dual Gr.1 winner of the VRC Derby and VRC Sires’ Produce Stakes.

  Their dam Blooms (Biscay-Queen’s Garden (IRE) by Mill Reef) also won one race (1200m). Her dam also produced stakes winner Zephyr Isle (14 wins) and is a half-sister to the good stayer Meadowville, runner up in the Irish Derby and St Leger and the English St Leger.

  The next dam Meadow Pipet is by Worden, a half-brother to the great Newhaven Park sire Wilkes (FR). A winner of the Leopardstown Produce Stakes and dam of Captain’s Wings, Meadow Pipet is a half-sister to English Derby winner and sire Larkspur (Never Say Die-Skylarking by Precipitation). Her dam Woodlark (Bois Roussel) is a half-sister to sires Borealis (Brumeux), Alycidon (Donatello II), Agricola (Precipitation) and Acropolis (Donatello II) and from Aurora (Hyperion). Woodlark’s half-sister Arousal (Fairway) is fourth dam of Cheraw (Caro), who had much success at stud in WA.

  This relationship with such a major mare as Aurora, his eighth dam, also provides many mating opportunities, especially via Agricola (who stood in NZ and later at Kirkham Stud Newhaven Park).

  Bede Murray, a very good trainer with stables at his Conjola property and at Kembla Grange, purchased his most expensive yearling when he went to $80,000 to buy Universal Prince at the 1999 Australian Easter Yearling Sale.

  The good looking colt was raced by Terry Hogan, along with Terry’s daughter Vicky and her husband and Mark Brady and had his first start as a two year-old on home track Kembla Grange on February 26, 2000, winning a 1200m maiden. He was then second at Canterbury and won again over 1200m at Kembla before being spelled.

  At three he resumed on August 26 with a first-up fifth in the Winfreux Quality (1200m) at Rosehill and was then fourth in the Listed Heritage Stakes on that track before a brilliant win in the Spring Stakes-Gr.3 (1600m) at Newcastle, delighting fans with his last to first dash, something that was to becomae a trademark of his career.

  He was again seventh on the turn at his next start and came late, and wide, to collect the Spring Champion Stakes-Gr.1 (2000m) at Randwick from Falls the Shadow and Go Bint. Back to 1600m next start, he was eighth behind eventually-disqualified Skalato (the race awarded to Show a Heart) in the Caulfield Guineas-Gr.1 and was then second in the AAMI Vase-Gr.2 (2040m) at Moonee Valley. The VRC Derby-Gr.1 was next, but the slow track and his habit of getting back in the field played against him and he wasn’t able to run down Hit the Roof, finishing second in the 2500m event.

  Off the scene until March 2001, he was fourth when resuming in the Hobartville Stakes-Gr.2 (1400m) and then performed another of his incredible last-to-first feats in taking the Canterbury Guineas-Gr.1 (1900m in 1:57.43) by two and three-quarter lengths from Danamite and Scenic Warrior. A seventh in the Rosehill Guineas (trapped behind a wall of runners on the inside) and second in the Tulloch Stakes (both 2000m) readied Universal Prince for the AJC Derby, and over 2400m on the big Randwick track he made no mistake, accelerating up the rise for Justin Sheehan to win by almost four lengths from Sir Clive and Danamite (2:30.8) in a field of 16.

  It was his third Gr.1 win and he joined Octagonal and Fairway as winners of the Canterbury Guineas-AJC Derby double. He was unplaced in the Queen Elizabeth Stakes before heading for a well deserved break as the leader of his generation.

  The Champion Three Year Old was unplaced in the Warwick Stakes when resuming at four, then third in the Craiglee Stakes-Gr.2 (1600m) and runner-up in the Underwood Stakes-Gr.1 (1800m) - to Northerly, beaten a short-neck after rocketing home, and the Turnbull Stakes-Gr.2 (2000m).

  Unplaced behind Northerly and Sunline in the Cox Plate, he failed in the Mackinnon Stakes and was controversially withdrawn by stewards from the Melbourne Cup on race eve.  He resumed with a great run over a mile when third in the Chipping Norton Stakes-Gr.1 (3/4 len and a sht half-hd behind Tie the Knot and Freemason) and then on March 9 he collected a fourth Gr.1 in the Ranvet Stakes, downing Dress Circle and Freemason at weight for age over 2000m on a dead track, with Tie the Knot unplaced.

  Univeral Prince looked to have the Tancred (BMW) Stakes-Gr.1 in his keeping next start but Melbourne Cup-Caulfield Cup heroine Ethereal caught him in the last bound, winning by a head. At least it gave connections some joy though after being denied a Melbourne Cup start, to know that not much more than a “cigarette paper” separated the two outstanding performers at the end of the 2400m at wfa.

  Next came two runs abroad, resulting in a fourth of 14 in the Queen Elizabth II Gold Cup at Sha Tin and a last place in the Singapore International Cup.

  Universal Prince’s final campaign began on September 7, 2002 when third in the Tramway Handicap-Gr.3 (1400m) before unplaced runs in the Doncaster Handicap and Caulfield Cup prompted the decision to retire the five year-old. He retired as the winner of seven races, with seven seconds and three thirds in 30 starts for $2.978m.

  Universal Prince must rank as one of the most genuine and high class performers of recent times and his enormous acceleration at the end of his races really endeared him to a legion of fans.

  As a multiple Gr.1 performer and classic winner who combines the blood of turf greats Northern Dancer, Sir Ivor, Star Kingdom and Mill Reef among others, Universal Prince has all the credentials to make the grade as a sire and he’s sure to be well supported at Dr Jack and Sue Woolridge’s Inverness Stud, in the NSW Southern Highlands.