‘It’s not too late to book in for this season’
Geisel Park Stud expecting a flurry of interest in Manhattan Rain following wonderful weekend
While you’d think standing a half-brother to Redoute’s Choice (Danehill) in Western Australia might have been an easier sell than it has been, Geisel Park Stud have high hopes a booming run of results will spark a surge in demand for Manhattan Rain (Encosta De Lago) now and into the future.
The Golden Slipper winner-producing stallion went west in 2022, when bought by Geisel Park and a group of WA-based breeders after previously standing at Arrowfield Stud and Victoria’s Blue Gum Farm.
However, the 19-year-old has been something of a slow burner in his new home.
After starting with 68 mares at $8,800, he’s covered books of 37 and 31 in the past two springs at $8,250, and this season has been looking set to serve a similar number at $6,050.
The past few weeks may alter those projections.
On Cox Plate Day, Manhattan Rain’s seven-year-old son Jigsaw looked a sprinter revived when he took the McEwen Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m), having also scored the start before in Cranbourne’s Apache Cat Classic (1200m) for his first win in two-and-a-half years.
A week later, on VRC Derby day, Manhattan Rain’s lightly raced six-year-old daughter New York Lustre broke through for a first black type success in the Begonia Belle Stakes (Gr 3, 1100m).
And three weeks on from that, on Saturday Manhattan Rain landed the feature race double at Cranbourne’s highlight meeting of the year.
First, exciting four-year-old Sabaj took the Cranbourne Cup (Listed, 1600m) for a fifth win from eight starts, becoming his sire’s 21st individual stakes victor, and earning predictions from co-trainer Mick Price that there’d be “a good race” in prospect for him in the autumn.
Then 40 minutes later Jigsaw made it three wins on the bounce by leading throughout in the $1 million The Meteorite (1200m), with his trainer Cindy Alderson earning high praise for her work in revitalising the gelding.
The string of results has come at an opportune time, with Manhattan Rain’s first WA-bred crop of two-year-olds about to hit the tracks, and with Geisel Park reporting word from local stables that there are several promising types among them.
Geisel Park owner Eddie Rigg hopes WA breeders will have been as impressed as he has been with the stallion’s bounteous season so far.
While Manhattan Rain sits 51st on Australia’s general sires’ table, only nine stallions have sired more stakes winners this season than his three, and they include such luminaries as I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit) (seven), Street Boss (Street Cry) and Written Tycoon (Iglesia) (five each) and Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice) and Zoustar (Northern Meteor) (four each).
“What a spring carnival he’s had,” Rigg told ANZ News of Manhattan Rain.
“He gets winners all the time at a good rate, but he’s really going through a purple patch at the moment. Jigsaw winning The Meteorite, New York Lustre winning on Derby day, and now Sabaj looks like a ripper.
“I think these results he’s been getting will cause a realisation, particularly for some people over here, that he is a really good stallion. People should be sending their mares to him.
“He’s always been a good stallion, and he looks even better today than when we got him three years ago. But we just haven’t had the support which he deserves. We’d have hoped he’d have got more support than he has so far, but hopefully results like Saturday’s will give him a good push along.
“It’s not too late to book in for this season, after all.”
Rigg said Manhattan Rain would have a number of offspring to go under the hammer at the Magic Millions Perth Yearling Sale in February, including an “exceptional” Geisel Park colt out of Troodles (Star Witness) who “we expect will sell very well”.
He hopes by then Manhattan Rain’s first western two-year-olds will have fomented keen interest in his yearlings.
The sire’s number one performer so far has been a star juvenile in 2017 Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m) heroine She Will Reign, who went on to add a second elite victory in the MVRC Moir Stakes (Gr 1, 1000m).
Overall, Manhattan Rain has six two-year-old stakes winners from 150 runners at 4.0 per cent.
“His first lot of two-year-olds are about to start racing here in Perth. I expect they’ll go pretty well,” Riggs said. “If they go well over on the east coast in a pretty competitive environment, I’m sure they’ll do well over here.
“We’ve heard plenty of good reports about them.”
Geisel Park will race one Manhattan Rain two-year-old who Rigg considers classy enough to have earned his highest plaudit – to be named after a word or phrase from his favourite movie, The Castle.
Following on from Sponge Cake (Harry Angel), Rissoles (Playing God), Seasoning (All American), Move The Torana (Lean Mean Machine) and Ascot winner Dug Another Hole (Universal Ruler), here comes It’s Chicken (Manhattan Rain), out of the Star Witness mare Star Subject.
“I only give them Castle names if they’re any good, and It’s Chicken looks alright,” Rigg said of the filly, who’ll be trained by Daniel and Ben Pearce, and was broken in by another prominent trainer, Dion Luciani.
“Dion is one of the main breakers in Perth, and he thinks It’s Chicken is one of the nicest two-year-olds he’s touched this year.”
Since siring his star juvenile She Will Reign, Manhattan Rain has also again shown his versatility, with staying filly Benagil winning this year’s SAJC Australasian Oaks (Gr 1, 2000m).
The sire’s other Group 1 winner has been Whisky Baron, who was South Africa’s Champion Middle Distance Horse in 2016-17, with six wins from 1200 metres to 2000 metres capped by Kenilworth’s Sun Met Handicap (Gr 1, 2000m). That win triggered a European campaign, where Whisky Baron was second in Goodwood’s Celebration Mile (Gr 2, 1m).
“He’s produced a Golden Slipper winner, but they can stay on a bit too,” said Rigg, noting the Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott-trained Runaway had won the VRC St Leger (Listed, 2800m) and the Geelong Cup (Gr 3, 2400m), had contested a Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m) and even won a 3280-metre steeplechase at Sale a month off turning eight.
“They can also train on. Jigsaw’s seven and going as well as ever, if not better. New York Lustre’s six.”
Aside from the stallion having left performers over a range of distances, Rigg believes Manhattan Rain also makes appeal as a broodmare sire, like his more famous half-brother Redoute’s Choice, three times Australia’s champion sire and champion broodmare sire.
Both are members of families that keep on giving, being sons of the great Australian blue hen Shantha’s Choice (Canny Lad), and with the hugely influential American matriarch Best In Show (Traffic Judge) as their fourth dam.
Furthermore, Manhattan Rain’s own sire Encosta De Lago won four Australian broodmare sire titles.
So far, Manhattan Rain as a broodmare sire has five stakes winners from a relatively small group of 216 starters, at 2.3 per cent. That compares to his ten years older half-brother Redoute’s Choice’s 182 from 3,220 at 5.7 per cent.
“We think Manhattan Rain is going to end up being a very good broodmare sire,” Riggs said. “The early signs are very promising in that department, and with that pedigree on his side, it just gives him every chance, being a half to Redoute’s Choice and out of Shantha’s Choice. Having Encosta for a dad doesn’t hurt either.
“That was one of the reasons we bought him – his pedigree is so good.”