Colt bids to enhance his family’s prolific legacy
Trainer Robert Heathcote is hoping to continue the remarkable success his stable has enjoyed with the progeny of Funtantes (Easy Rocking) when his homebred colt Fabulantes (Star Turn) contests the Tattersall’s Stakes (Listed, 1400m) at Eagle Farm on Saturday.
Funtantes won ten races – including three in stakes company – during her career on the track for Heathcote, who had previously saddled up her dam Cantantes (Just Awesome) to two victories during the early stages of his training career.
Cantantes became a proven producer and she has clearly passed that family trait onto her daughter, with Funtantes having a profound impact on Heathcote’s operation since she was retired to the breeding barn in 2013. The mare’s progeny have so far accumulated 25 victories – including the Group 1 triumph of Startantes (Star Turn) in the Tattersall’s Tiara (1400m) – and Heathcote estimates he has now trained close to 70 winners from the family.
Three years on from Startantes’ heroics, Heathcote is adamant that Abounding (Rich Enuff) is quite capable of delivering a second success in the Tatts Tiara and he also believes Startantes’ brother Fabulantes will be ideally suited to the step up to 1400 metres on his home track after launching from last place to finish fifth – beaten 2.2 lengths – in the Oxlade Stakes (Listed, 1200m) ten days ago.
Having made a winning debut at Ipswich at the end of April, at his next start on an attritional Gold Coast track Fabulantes was no match for Peter Snowden’s colt Beadman (Snitzel), who ran right up to his $900,000 price-tag with a ten-length romp in the Ken Russell Classic (Gr 3, 1200m).
But according to Heathcote, if Fabulantes can replicate his effort in the Oxlade Stakes against what would appear a reasonably even field of juveniles in the Tattersall’s Stakes, the bay colt should be figuring in the finish.
“I thought he was probably the run of the entire day last time at Eagle Farm,” Heathcote told ANZ News.
“Nothing made up any ground on that fast track all day, and yet he was storming home after being inconvenienced earlier in the run. I really think a lot of him, which is why he’s still a colt at this stage. He’s obviously the full-brother to Startantes so if he can prove himself with a stakes win, he might become an attractive stallion prospect.
“Startantes was an elite performer over 1400-metres and all of the colt’s siblings have raced better over seven furlongs. So he’s bred to get over that distance, and I think he’ll really enjoy the extra 200 metres on Saturday.”
Fabulantes is the sixth foal by Funtantes to reach the racetrack, with his elder sibling Amuseantes – a three-year-old filly by Rothfire’s sire Rothesay (Fastnet Rock) – aiming to enhance her dam’s prolific strike rate and become the mare’s sixth individual winner when she contests the QTIS 3YO Fillies Maiden (1200m) on Saturday’s Eagle Farm program.
Amuseantes’ brother Ziemba (Rothesay) got the ball rolling in fine style with a dynamic debut at Doomben in June 2019, bringing up the first of his six career wins before he passed the baton over to his half-sister.
Startantes promptly burst onto the scene with five wins from her first eight starts, but it was for the sixth and final victory of her career that she will be remembered as the lone filly in the race mowed down her older rivals with a withering burst to claim the final Group 1 of the 2022 season under Jason Collett.
It would prove to be the crowning achievement of her career before she was retired and put through the ring at last year’s Inglis Chairman’s Sale, where she was knocked down for $1.15 million to Widden Stud.
The sale marked a spectacular result for Heathcote, who is now thanking his lucky stars that Funtantes fell $50,000 short of her reserve price at the 2012 Magic Millions National Broodmare Sale.
“It’s funny how life works out sometimes, because if she’d made $300,000 then I would have sold the mare and we wouldn’t have enjoyed all this success,” said Heathcote, who recently welcomed the latest product off the Funtantes conveyor belt – a filly by Pierata (Pierro) – into his stables.
“We had Cantantes in at the same sale, and she also failed to make her reserve. For the life of me I’ll never work out why neither of them were sold that day, but I’m certainly glad they weren’t. You see some pretty slow mares who are sold for $500,000 purely on their pedigrees. Their bloodlines may be superior, but if it’s slow blood they’re passing on their foals probably won’t be much good either!
“It’s just a winning family, but it almost came to an end five years ago when we thought we were going to have to put Funtantes down. She had fractured a bone just below her fetlock, so we took her to the hospital and they put titanium screws into the joint to repair it. Her body rejected them and so a month later, she had to have them all taken out. We didn’t think she would survive but she’s just such a tough mare, and later that year she gave birth to Amuseantes who runs at Eagle Farm on Saturday.”
Heathcote will be hoping Amuseantes can kick-start a big day for the stable, with Prince Of Boom (Spirit Of Boom) due to line up in the W.J. Healy Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m), while Demon Darb (Pierro) is set to contest the Tattersall’s Mile (Listed, 1600m).
But the headline runner is Abounding, who has been a real money-spinner for First Light Racing with five wins and more than $2.3 million banked from her 22 starts.
Despite her current price of $17 for the Tatts Tiara, Heathcote is not fearful of any of her rivals with wide gates having repeatedly cruelled his mare’s prospects of claiming her first win since last year’s Tattersall’s Classic (Listed, 1200m) at Doomben.
In her five outings since then, the lowest barrier she has jumped from was 12 so by the law of averages, the daughter of Rich Enuff (Written Tycoon) is due a softer draw which should theoretically enable her to settle much closer to the speed.
“She’s just been so damn unlucky,” Heathcote told ANZ News.
“She was beaten two lengths in this race last year by Bella Nipotina, who went on to win The Everest, and the mare is going every bit as good if not better than she was 12 months ago. She’s now had seven consecutive double figure barriers, and I don’t care what anyone says – barriers can make all the difference between winning and losing.
“When Jason [Collett] got off her after the Dane Ripper, he was adamant she would have gone very close to winning if we’d drawn a gate and got a softer run. And it’s been the same story every time she’s run this year, so it’s beginning to sound like a broken record. But if we can draw a single figure barrier, I really think she’s got as good a chance as any other runner in the race.”