Thoroughbred Talks: Which sires have produced the most champion horses?

It’s easy to see why sires are the center of attention regarding breeding. Compared to dams, sires have a far higher lifetime reproductive output.

Although it’s not a given that a champion sire would produce another champion offspring, several of the sport’s most incredible horses have become notable sires whose talents have been passed down the generations. Let’s see the top sires in Australia who have produced champion horses in the global equestrian arena.

I Am Invincible

For the sum of A$62,500, I Am Invincible was purchased by Ray and Brett Gall from his original trainer, Toby Edmonds, at the 2006 Inglis NSW Classic Twilight Session. 

Former racehorse I Am Invincible now serves as a sire at Scone, New South Wales’s Yarraman Park Stud. His base rate for his stud services was $11,000. The price rose to $247,500 in 2019, becoming Australia’s most expensive stallion. Winx and Black Caviar, two of Australia’s top horses, were recently serviced by him. He was the Australian version of Into Mischief who sired chief earner Life is Good, the 2022 Pegasus World Cup Invitational Champion.

The Yarraman Park Stud, owned by the Mitchell family, has set I Am Invincible’s service fee for 2022 at $247,500. He is competing for his first Australian champion sire title this year (all fees inc GST).

I Am Invincible, the most popular stallion in Australia, is already fully booked for the upcoming breeding season, with bookings exceeding the number he received in 2019, the season before the epidemic. This is proof of the stallion’s popularity in the breeding shed and at auction, where his offspring consistently fetch high prices.

Written Tycoon

Australian Thoroughbred Written Tycoon (foaled September 6, 2002) is a champion racehorse and successful sire, having sired many Group 1 winners.

Written Tycoon started as a stud in 2007 for a service charge of $8,250, but his popularity and earnings skyrocketed after he produced some exceptional offspring. In 2013, he was transferred to Woodside Park Stud with a stud fee of $13,750. His service charge had risen to $110,000 by 2018. In 2020, Written Tycoon moved to Arrowfield Stud, New South Wales.

He was the leading first-season sire in Australia in 2010-2011, the leading sire of two-year-olds in 2015-2016, and the 2020-2021 Australian Champion, with a total of 759 wins from 998 runners. In 2022, yearlings sired by Written Tycoon cost well over $1.4 million, with an average sale price of approximately $325,000.

Zoustar

Chris Waller trains Australian 12-year-old bay stallion Zoustar at Rosehill. This colt was produced by the dam Zouzou and the stallion Northern Meteor. Six races have been won by Zoustar so far in its career.

Widden Stud, located in New South Wales’s Hunter Valley, paid A$18 million to acquire Zoustar upon his retirement. For his first four seasons, Zoustar was paid a service charge of $44,000. By 2021 this has climbed to A$154,000, and in 2022, it has reached A$198,000.

Redoute’s Choice

Redoute’s Choice, a Muzaffar Yaseen-bred horse, born on August 15, 1996, was kept for racing in the now-famous Teeley Assets colors of yellow, red, lime green, and orange. The remarkably stunning colt was prepped for his $1.6 million racing career by Melbourne trainer Rick Hore-Lacy, whom Mr. Yaseen sent him to. The colt made ten starts and won five times.

After his retirement in 2000, Redoute’s Choice became a stallion at Arrowfield Stud. Redoute’s Choice was one of the rarest Thoroughbred horses, surpassing even the high standards set by his magnificent body, excellent pedigree, and spectacular racing record to become a world-class sire, a sensational sire of sires and broodmares, and a phenomenon in the sales ring,

In his first season, he served 134 mares for a fee of AU$30,000. However, with the success of his first stakes winners, Not A Single Doubt and Tahni Girl, as well as his leading sire title and first million-dollar yearling in 2003–2004, his fee soared to AU$1 million in his fifth season.

The impressive stallion passed away in 2019, leaving behind a legacy of 22 sons who sired stakes winners, 10 of them were also group 1 sires. They’ve sired 279 winners at the stakes level, with 86 coming from his daughters alone (including 13 at the group 1 level).

Snitzel

Snitzel, an Australian thoroughbred racehorse that won a Group 1 race, was born on August 24, 2002. He is now a prolific stallion who has produced more than 100 stakes winners.

The record-setting Champion Sire of 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020 in Australia, Snitzel, has remarkably influenced Australian racing and breeding, establishing new quality standards as a world-class and big-race sire.

With his 16th, 17th, and 18th Group 1 winner Wild Ruler, In the Congo, and Yearning, respectively, Snitzel has reinforced his legendary status in 2021/22.

Snitzel received his strongest season ever in the 2022 market, with ten yearlings selling for $1 million or more and an average price of $526,000 across 79 lots.

Conclusion

A foal’s quality is in part determined by the quality of its sire, which is why so much value is placed on the sire. The breeding careers of the stallions we’ve highlighted here have been outstanding, and their progeny are living proof of this.

Category: Breeding