RAILBIRDS everywhere, including the race places in Cavite and Batangas, were in horse heaven last Sunday during the 31st running of the Breeders’ Cup in Lexington, Kentucky.
The annual series of premier Grade I races, now more accessible via satellite and the Internet, attracts breeders from all over and bills itself as the universal championship of thoroughbred racing.
Among the triumphant entrants in last weekend’s lucrative event, considered a big boost to the faltering horse racing industry worldwide, is an equine star whose owner comes from east-central Asia.
Mongolian Saturday, ridden by US-based French jockey Florent Geroux, won the $1-million Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint by holding off a late charge by Lady Shipman in a 14-horse field on the turf at Keeneland Racecourse.
The 5-year-old gelding bred in the Blue Grass state is owned by business magnate Ganbaatar Dagvadorj and trained by Enebish Ganbat, both from Mongolia, a country where there are more horses than people.
Dagvadorj shelled out $60,000 to purchase Mongolian Saturday as a yearling. But the gelding has become his personal ATM ever since with in-the-money finishes in his last 10 outings. For Saturday’s win, Dagvadorj collected $500,000.
Mongolian Saturday’s victory in the Breeders’ Cup came 29 years after Manila, owned by another Asian, made its mark in the Super Bowl of horseracing.
The legendary stallion, bred by Filipino industrialist Eduardo Cojuangco, was a 3-year-old when he ruled the $2-million 1986 Breeders’ Cup Turf.
In that race, Manila won by a neck over Theatrical, the Ireland-bred bay stallion in a pulse-pounding finish at Santa Anita Racetrack near Los Angeles. His victims also included Dancing Brave, that year’s European Horse of the Year.
The 2.5-kilometer Breeders Cup Turf is one of eight races that comprise the annual Breeders’ Cup. It now carries a $3-million purse.
For his feat in the 1986 Breeders’ Cup, Manila won the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Male Horse of the Year.
Manila collected $2,692,799 in earnings and won 12 races, including nine straight. Some horse racing experts consider him and John Henry the top two long-distance turf horses in American horseracing history.
After a glorious career, including a repeat win over Theatrical in the 2 km Arlington Million in Illinois in 1987, Manila was syndicated for $20 million and retired to stud in Turkey where he died in 2009.
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The most fulfilling news out of Keeneland was the wire-to-wire, 6 1/2-length victory of Triple Crown winner American Pharoah over his closest pursuer in the centerpiece race, the 2 km $5-million Breeders’ Cup Classic.
After taking nine out of 11 career starts, Pharoah, the first Triple Crown winner in 37 years, ended his racing life with another first.
He becomes the only horse to sweep the Grand Slam of horseracing—the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes, the Belmont Stakes and the Breeders’ Cup Classic.
In case local thoroughbred breeders and owners are interested, the price tag for a genetic piece of American Pharoah will be high.
His stallion fee is likely to open at about $200,000, Ahmed Zayat, the Grand Slam winner’s owner told ESPN.com.