Newmarket trainer Jeremy Noseda must relish the opportunity to take a son of Awesome Again back across the Atlantic. In 2004 he pulled off a major surprise when saddling Awesome Again’s son Wilko – whose English turf form had established him as falling well short of the highest class – to win the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, beating the subsequent Preakness and Belmont Stakes winner Afleet Alex by three-quarters of a length. That 20/1 shock served as the prelude to Noseda’s latest venture, which involves taking Awesome Act back to the land of his birth to try to win the Kentucky Derby. This trip has started very promisingly with Awesome Act having landing the Grade Three Gotham Stakes at Aqueduct on his Stateside debut, emphasizing that, while Awesome Again’s profile in Europe is not high, in America the Adena Springs-based stallion has repeatedly been proven to be an extremely good sire of dirt runners, writes John Berry.
The success of Awesome Again, firstly as a racehorse and now as a stallion, has kept alive the proud tradition of Canada’s contribution to the thoroughbred’s story. The great Northern Dancer was, of course, bred in Canada at Windfields Farm in Ontario, the property named after the high-class racehorse and influential stallion Windfields, who was the first stakes winner bred there by the proprietor Edward Plunkett Taylor. Northern Dancer eventually spent the bulk of his stud career in America at the Maryland division of Windfields Farms, but his body was returned to his birthplace for burial after his death in 1990. While Northern Dancer’s early stars, such as Nijinsky , were Canadian-breds, the bulk of his champion sons and daughters were conceived in the States, so that nowadays it is easy to think of Northern Dancer’s massive contribution to the breed as being an American phenomenon. Happily, Awesome Again, a great-grandson of Northern Dancer, is a Canadian-bred, as were his sire Deputy Minister and his grandsire Vice Regent. The latter, a member of Northern Dancer’s second crop (the one which included Nijinsky and the champion racemare and broodmare Fanfreluche), was a proper Windfields Farm horse, having Windfields as the sire of his second dam Victoriana, who herself was the dam of another great Windfields-based stallion: Victoria Park (many of whose daughters proved good mates for Northern Dancer - including Nijinsky’s half-sister Fleur, whose flashy little chestnut Northern Dancer colt, called The Minstrel, won the Derby and Irish Derby in 1977).
Deputy Minister proved to be a very good horse, winning two Grade One races as a two-year-old and twice being Grade One placed at four. It would be hard to say that Awesome Again was the best of the 16 US Grade One winners which he sired in a very successful stud career (the fillies Go For Wand and Open Mind were very special, each winning seven Grade Ones including the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies) but he was probably the best colt, which is saying a lot as the list of Deputy Minister’s winners also includes the top-class two-year-olds Dehere and Salt Lake as well as the Belmont Stakes winner Touch Gold. Deputy Minister’s daughters, incidentally, have bred the likes of Curlin, Rags To Riches and her Belmont-winning half-brother Jazil, Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner Halfbridled and Wood Memorial winner Bob And John.
While Northern Dancer was synonymous with the great Canadian breeder E. P. Taylor, Awesome Again was bred and is owned by another Canadian who has made a major mark on modern-day racing: Frank Stronach. Unraced as a two-year-old, Awesome Again wasted no time in his three-year-old season (1997) in proving himself a high-class colt under the care of Californian trainer David Hofmans. After winning a maiden race at Hollywood Park by six lengths, he posted the rare achievement of winning a Grade One race on only his third start, landing Canada’s premier Classic, the Queen’s Plate, by three and a half lengths. In taking this time-honoured prize (which is restricted to Canadian-breds and is the longest-established race in north America, having been run continuously since 1860) he followed in the footsteps of the likes of Northern Dancer (who won it in 1964 after taking the Kentucky Derby), Victoria Park, Nijinsky’s dam Flaming Page, Hawk Wing’s dam La Lorgnette, and the successful stallions L'enjoleur and With Approval.
After adding his name to the Queen’s Plate’s roll of honour, Awesome Again headed back down to the United States and won the Grade Two Jim Dandy Stakes at Saratoga before finishing third to his paternal half-brother Deputy Commander and subsequent triple Grade One winner Behrens in the Grade One Travers Stakes at the same track. Sadly, Awesome Again’s season then ended on a downbeat note when he pulled up slightly sore after finishing a disappointing fifth in the Super Derby.
Awesome Again’s successes during 1997 had been part of a great run for David Hofmans’ stable, which had also landed that year’s Belmont Stakes with Touch Gold (another Stronach-owned son of Deputy Minister) as well as having sent out Alphabet Soup to win the previous year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic. However, Awesome Again found himself in a different stable for his four-year-old campaign, coming under the care of expatriate Englishman Patrick Byrne. Byrne had enjoyed a tremendous season in 1997, highlighted by a remarkable run of nine consecutive winners in the spring at Keeneland and Churchill Downs and by the Breeders’ Cup victories in the autumn of the two-year-olds Favorite Trick and Countess Diana. This led to his being offered the position of private trainer to Frank Stronach. He accepted the offer and, while the job turned out only to last a couple of years, Byrne enjoyed great success during his brief tenure. Awesome Again’s four-year-old season of 1998 was the cornerstone of this success.
In 1998, Awesome Again ran six times and won all six. These six victories comprised an allowance race at Churchill Downs (which he won by six lengths), two Grade Three contests (the Hawthorne Gold Cup and the Saratoga Breeders’ Cup), one Grade Two (the Stephen Foster Handicap, in which he beat Silver Charm, winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness in 1997 and of the Dubai World Cup in 1998) and two Grade Ones. The first of these Grade One victories saw Awesome Again coming home three lengths in front of Tale Of The Cat in the Whitney Handicap, while the latter was his finest hour: he beat Silver Charm and Swain in a vintage renewal of the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Churchill Downs. Having proven himself as a racehorse of the highest class, as well as one of admirable consistency, Awesome Again duly retired to Stronach’s Kentucky farm, Adena Springs, where he remains to this day with a current stud fee of $50,000 (live foal).
Although he is by a very good stallion and has great stallions as the sires of his dam and grand-dam (Blushing Groom and Mr Prospector respectively), Awesome Again was not able to bring a truly top-drawer pedigree to stud with him, even allowing for the fact that there were a few stakes performers in his immediate family, including his second dam Prime Prospect. It would, though, subsequently come to look better (largely thanks to his younger half-brother Macho Uno, winner of the 2000 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and of the following year’s Pennsylvania Derby). However, that was not really relevant: when a horse has proved himself as accomplished a racehorse as Awesome Again had shown himself to be, he is by definition an exciting stallion prospect.
We did not have to wait long before discovering that Awesome Again was indeed a top-class sire, because his first crop contained Ghostzapper, whose win as a four-year-old in the Breeders’ Cup Classic meant that Awesome Again became the first (and remains the only) Breeders’ Cup Classic winner to sire a winner of the race. That victory at Lone Star Park was Ghostzapper’s fourth Grade One triumph, but he hadn’t actually been Awesome Again’s first Grade One winner: that honour fell to Toccet, who got his sire off to a flying start by winning two Grade One races (the Champagne Stakes and the Hollywood Futurity) as a two-year-old. The same crop also included the Grade Three winners Snorter, Personal Legend and Hotstufanthensome.
Three Graded stakes winners came out of Awesome Again’s second crop (Anew, Pink Champagne and Rumor Has It) while his third crop contained his second Breeders’ Cup winner: the aforementioned Wilko. It also included his third Breeders’ Cup winner Round Pond (who posted her second Grade One triumph when landing the Distaff as a four-year-old at Churchill Downs in 2006) and the lesser Grade One winners Spun Sugar and Dubai Escapade. Awesome Again’s reputation as a sire for the Breeders’ Cup meeting was further enhanced when his fourth crop contained the tremendous racemare Ginger Punch, winner of six Grade One races including the Breeders’ Cup Distaff at Monmouth Park as a four-year-old in 2007. The same crop also contained the Grade One winner Sugar Shake and the dual Grade Two winner Awesome Gem, while Awesome Again recorded his ninth individual Grade One winner when Daaher, a member of his fifth crop, landed the Cigar Mile at Aqueduct as a three-year-old in 2007.
It has to be said that Awesome Again has, at present, been unable to maintain the momentum of the early years of his stud career. Currently, the only one of his sons or daughters under the age of six to have won above Grade Three level has been Springside, winner of the Grade Two Demoiselle Stakes at Aqueduct as a two-year-old in 2008. However, that could all change if, as seems very possible, Awesome Act can build on the form he showed when winning the Gotham Stakes earlier this month. He is certainly bred to win a top-class race, having the great Natalma (dam of Northern Dancer and third dam of Danehill) as his fourth dam, Orpen’s grand-dam Raise The Standard as his third dam, Machiavellian’s Group Three-winning dam Coup De Folie as his second dam and Machiavellian’s winning full-sister Houdini's Honey as his dam.
It appears as if, whether or not he reaches the very top, Awesome Act’s future lies in the United States, which is fair enough as Awesome Again’s record as a sire provides overwhelming evidence that his stock thrive best on American dirt. Even so, Awesome Again has been represented in America by the turf Grade Three winners Pink Champagne, Hotstufanthensome and Rumor Has It, and it is far from impossible that he could register his first European Group winner at some stage in the future – even if the dirt races at the Breeders’ Cup seem to be those in which his offspring most excel. In that respect, his is very much a case of ‘like father, like son’.
