Blue Gum backs best years yet for Flying Artie
Flying Artie (Artie Schiller) is living up to his name, with another stakes victory for his son Sixties on Saturday putting him up in lights as he bears down on his first 100-winner season.
But despite having six crops racing now, his home base Blue Gum Farm believes he’s only getting started.
The stud world has lately been dotted with stories of stallions hitting some golden years after – in some cases long after – it had been hoped they would reach a peak.
Another Victorian-based stallion, Darley’s Street Boss (Street Cry), is enjoying a distinct career boom at 21, with track stars including Saturday’s Black Caviar Lightning Stakes (Gr 1, 1000m) winning three-year-old Tentyris helping him to a personal best of eighth place on the Australian general sires’ table, and equal second by stakes winners.
Coolmore’s on-and-off shuttler Starspangledbanner (Choisir), the 19-year-old with an Australian stakes winners-to-runners ratio of 4.31 per cent, achieved the extremely rare feat of siring Europe’s Champion 2YO Colt and Filly last year in Gstaad and Precise, who both won at the highest level.
Flying Artie is a long way behind that pair in age and runners, but the 12-year-old, despite being faced with overcoming the stigma of having been moved on by another stud, is building a strong head of steam on a couple of fronts.
The Coolmore Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) hero’s winners-to-runners ratio of 62.42 per cent underlines his consistency, while last season’s $11,000 (inc GST) service fee puts him firmly in the value category.
But a clutch of unqualified star runners has shown him to be far more than that.
Most famously, Flying Artie is the sire of Europe’s reigning Champion Sprinter Asfoora, the brilliant mare whose three Group 1 triumphs among eight stakes wins have come in England (two) and France.
His other elite winner, Artorius, is now making inroads at his father’s former stud Newgate Farm, with his first yearlings being offered this season.
And now Artorius’s full brother Sixties is emerging as his sire’s latest special one.
Chris Waller’s colt looked imperious in claiming his second Group 3 victory at start number eight in Saturday’s CS Hayes Stakes (Gr 3, 1400m) as a $1.60 favourite. Unbeaten in two starts this campaign, he’s now a $3.50 second favourite for the Australian Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) at Flemington on February 28 as he shapes to become Flying Artie’s next top-tier winner.
That is if In Flight doesn’t beat him to it. The Joe Pride-Proven Thoroughbreds five-year-old won a stakes race in each of the three eastern seaboard states last preparation, and is set to resume soon aimed at Rosehill’s The Galaxy (Gr 1, 1100m), for which she’s a $15 shot.
Flying Artie’s first – and small – Blue Gum crop is being offered at the current range of yearling sales. The full brother to his third-highest ranked offspring – triple Hong Kong stakes winner My Wish – was bought at Inglis Classic last week by Lok Lor, underscoring Flying Artie’s appeal to buyers from the territory.
This timeline means the last of the six crops Flying Artie sired at Newgate are now two years old. He was well patronised at the Hunter Valley farm, averaging 151 mares through his first five seasons there.
“I think people tend to forget he covered some big and seriously good books at Newgate,” Blue Gum Farm’s nominations and sales manager Phil Marshall told ANZ.
“Those offspring are maturing now, so there’s every chance we’re going to see a lot of success from his progeny in the next 12, 18 or 24 months. I think we’ll see a lot more from Flying Artie over the next little bit.”
Flying Artie has had nine winners in the past week, starting with a Doomben double through six-year-old gelding Super Zamboni and four-year-old mare Bengal Diamond, and running through to Saturday’s success of Sixties at Flemington and Chill Buddy (née Sponge Bob) in Hong Kong.
He has 58 winners in Australia for the current season after a personal best 89 last term, plus four stakes winners worldwide in Asfoora, My Wish, Sixties and his Waller stablemate Skyglider, as well as three more black type placegetters in Flying Orchid and Perth pair Ninetymilestraight and Amjaad.
“He’s one of the most, if not the most, underrated horses standing in the country at present,” Marshall said.
“When you consider he operates at a winners-to-runners ratio of significantly more than 60 per cent, and that since the start of the season he’s had four stakes winners and a further three stakes-placed horses…
“Seven stakes performers since the start of August is a phenomenal achievement, for a horse who stands at ten grand. I reckon I’ll be waiting a while for someone to find a better value horse right now.
“If you’re looking to try to produce yourself a winner, then clearly he’s the best option for anyone.”
Marshall said that Flying Artie, who has been Blue Gum’s clear flagbearer following the untimely death of Sejardan (Sebring) in November, is a consistent sire of winners but so much more.
“He’s building on his winners in Australia. He’s got 58 in Australia so far this season, so he’s on track to break the 100 mark for the first time,” Marshall said.
“And with the numbers he’s got coming through in his two, three and four-year-olds, he’s the sort of horse we’d fully expect to get 100-plus winners for the next two or three seasons at least. But he also has the runs on the board now to show he can sire a seriously good horse.
“You’ve got Asfoora and Artorius. Sixties and My Wish are Group 1 winners in waiting, and hopefully In Flight as well, so who’s to say he might not end this year with four or five Group 1 winners to his name?
“Then you’d start comparing him to sires like All Too Hard. He’s a terrific sire, and the sire of five Group 1 winners, so you’d be able to start comparing Flying Artie to those horses who are deemed superior to him at present.
“There’s too much evidence there to suggest he isn’t a good sire.”
Largely on the back of Asfoora’s deeds, Flying Artie surged in popularity with breeders last year, covering 96 mares at a reduced $11,000 after serving just 37 and 44 in the previous two years, at $16,500.
Aside from his upswinging CV, the imposing, 16.2 hand bay makes outcross appeal, being free of Danehill and his sire Danzig, and hailing from a Sadler’s Wells (Northern Dancer) sireline that leads to his American father Artie Schiller.
Artorius and Sixties are out of a Redoute’s Choice (Danehill) mare, while Asfoora’s dam is by I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit).
Marshall said it had “taken people a while to sit up and take note” of Flying Artie, and conceded he has had to battle the stigma of being moved on by Newgate.
“That’s always going to be a sticky mark for a sire,” he said. “But while that may have been a stigma for him in the first couple of years at Blue Gum, now the facts and figures speak for themselves. He’s just a very good sire, at a great price, and people just need to take him at face value and realise that.
“It was an upward curve for him last year in terms of numbers. I’d expect him to cover a similar number this breeding season, and I think he’s going to go from strength to strength in the next 12 months or so.
“He’s a very underrated sire who ticks a lot of boxes, and he suits the Danehill line mares so well.
“Trainers are starting to realise that Flying Arties are the horses they want in their stables. He reminds me a lot of Magnus, for the fact that his stock wins a lot of races, and trainers need to win races.”
Marshall said Blue Gum had yet to determine Flying Artie’s service fee for this year, but added “we want to make sure he’s still good value and within reach of every breeder in the country.”