King Of Roseau
It was fitting indeed that King Of Roseau (Capitalist) became a stakes winner at Flemington on Saturday, for the defining feature of his pedigree – aside from a triplication of Danehill (Danzig) – is a glorious affinity with Australia’s oldest and grandest course.
The gelding has a decidedly colonial pedigree – again, away from the three Danehills – with his past 11 dams carrying the (AUS) suffix, stretching back to British taproot Rosedale (Tynedale), who arrived soon after the first Ashes Test in 1877.
The family affair with Flemington began as a hot and hasty dalliance over the sprints, evolved into something more enduring, then has returned to the short course with King Of Roseau’s victory up the straight in Australia’s traditional first black type race of the season, the Aurie’s Star Handicap (Gr 3, 1200m).
It kicks off with the four-year-old’s seventh dam Waltzing Lily (Beau Fils), a gun sprinter of the Great Depression in the early 1930s. Over the same course as her descendant’s Saturday victory almost a century hence, she won the Newmarket Handicap of 1933 as a three-year-old filly, in a three-way struggle hailed by the Burnie Advocate as “one of the greatest finishes ever seen” in the 60 editions of the race.
Waltzing Lily won four other modern Group 1s in Moonee Valley’s William Reid Stakes (1200m) and Caulfield’s Memsie (twice) and Futurity Stakes (1400m), as well as achieving another Flemington straight six success in the Standish Handicap.
Yet despite her sprinting prowess, and at the ripe old age of 21, Waltzing Lily threw King of Roseau’s sixth dam, Waltzing Lady (Masthead) – who triumphed at Flemington in the 1953 VRC Oaks, then still run over the classic 2400m, before its 1973 shift to its current 2500m.
Waltzing Lady, an outstanding 11-time winner, also shone at headquarters in taking the 1954 Kewney Stakes over 2000 metres – now a Group 2 – before retiring to stud and throwing King Of Roseau’s fifth dam, Snowline (Arctic Explorer).
More Flemington staying honours flowed. Snowline left three stakes winners, including the redoubtable Silver Sharpe (Showdown), who took the VRC Derby of 1970. With all the Derbies run in spring back then, this came amid a hat-trick of them for Silver Sharpe, who won the AJC version four weeks earlier, and Queensland’s just a week after Flemington’s.
Snowline also threw two winners of Flemington’s Edward Manifold Stakes (1600m) in 1968 winner Snowtop and 1976 victor Snowmist – King Of Roseau’s fourth dam.
As an 18-year-old in 1991, Snowmist threw Best Percentage (Gold And Ivory), who was unraced but left another top tier winner for the family in Danni Martine (Danzero), as well as the twice Group-placed Rory’s Ratio (Rory’s Jester).
From 14 starts for Guy Walter, Danni Martine won Rosehill’s Coolmore Classic (Gr 1, 1500m) in 2005, and came third in the Queen Of The Turf Stakes (Gr 1, 1500m) and Doncaster Handicap (Gr 1, 1600m) on her next two starts.
She went to stud and in 2014 threw, as her last foal, Dominica (Choisir) – dam of King Of Roseau – the gelding who revived his female line’s glorious Flemington history on Saturday in his second look at the track. The first was a third place in last spring’s Poseidon Stakes (Listed, 1100m) behind an in-form pair in Growing Empire (Zoustar) and First Settler (Written Tycoon).
The colonial flavour to King Of Roseau extends beyond his own female line. His sire Capitalist hails from two more Australian stallions – Written Tycoon and Iglesia – while on his female side, after New Zealand dam Kitalpha (Fusaichi Pegasus), Capitalist’s next five dams carry the AUS suffix.
Among the four duplications in King Of Roseau’s first six generations, two are key Australian stallions. Both are by the breed-shaping Irish-bred great, Star Kingdom (Stardust), and they both appear at 6m x 5f.
Biscay comes in via Marscay – Iglesia’s damsire – and Pensive Mood, Choisir’s second dam. And Kaoru Star appears through his greatest offspring Luskin Star – who’s Capitalist’s third damsire – and Confidentially, the dam of Danzero (Danehill).
King Of Roseau’s first two damsires are Australian-bred in Choisir (Danehill Dancer) and Danzero, which brings us to that aforementioned bit of spice in this pedigree.
As has been well documented, doubling Danehill can be tricky. This time, tripling him seems to have been far from detrimental, sitting as he does at 4f x 4m, 4m.
Dominica brings a Danehill duplication through the statistically least favourable combination of double male – and close-up and influential at 3m x 3m – via her grandsires Danehill Dancer and Danzero.
That might not have done Dominica many favours. She raced seven times for wins at Muswellbrook and Quirindi.
But infused with a dash of Danehill female – Capitalist’s second dam Compulsion – the blend certainly doesn’t appear to have done King Of Roseau any harm, with the Peter Snowden trained sprinter’s 18 starts having yielded four wins and six placings, two of those at stakes level.
King Of Roseau’s breeders are Scone couple Senga Bissett and Ivan Woodford-Smith, who built a strong reputation as Ashleigh Thoroughbreds until selling up four years ago, and now keep a handful of mares. They’ve bred three Group 1 winners in Captivant, Bulla Borghese (Belong To Me) and Danni Martine, so have a rich CV.
Having bought Best Percentage privately in the early 1990s and bred and raced Danni Martine, they put the latter to Choisir to produce Dominica. They knew that would give Dominica her 3m x 3m duplication of Danehill, though at that stage – 2013 – the stats on double male Danehill probably weren’t as bleak as they are now.
They then put Dominica to Capitalist knowing it would give the resultant foal triple Danehill, but again, weren’t largely put off.
“It was mostly about the type,” Bissett told It’s In The Blood.
“Dominica was a beautiful big scopey mare. I’m a big fan of Capitalist, but he’s not the biggest stallion, and he gets great types out of roomy, scopey mares.
“I didn’t see the triple Danehill as a risk, or else I wouldn’t have done it. The only possible drawback I had in mind was that if it was a colt and he was good enough to become a stallion, having triple Danehill might make him a bit of a tricky breeding proposition.
“So many of the mares about the place have Danehill in them, and if you were to put one of those to him, the foal would have quadruple Danehill.”
The foal was indeed a colt, but any stallion considerations were removed early on, with a scalpel.
So undeterred were Bissett and Woodford-Smith, they’ve done it again. Early next year, they’ll be selling a Capitalist colt out of their mare Gangika (Sepoy), who has Danehill at 4f x 4f, 4m.
Having Danehill three times means you’ll have plenty of his mighty grandsire Northern Dancer (Nearctic) and that stallion’s famous dam Natalma (Native Dancer) – since Danehill has Natalma twice. All up, she’s in King Of Roseau’s pedigree eight times.
You’ll also have another hugely influential blue hen in Flower Bowl (Alibhai), the dam of Danehill’s damsire His Majesty (Ribot). Better still, King Of Roseau has Flower Bowl one extra time, for 6m x 6m, 6m, 6m. His Majesty’s full-brother Graustark is the third sire of that third dam, Best Percentage.
After Best Percentage’s star daughter Danni Martine went to stud, Bissett and Woodford-Smith fared well. Three of her first six foals sold as yearlings for $600,000, $350,000 and $600,000.
They decided to keep her seventh – Dominica – since she was a filly. They didn’t know she’d be not only the last filly but the last foal Danni Martine would throw.
The breeders first put Dominica to Written By (Written Tycoon), producing Antilles, a now five-year-old mare with one bush win to her name. A second try with another son of Written Tycoon – Capitalist – has achieved a better result in King Of Roseau.
Sadly, he would be Dominica’s last foal, a post-birth bout of colic turning fatal and leaving King Of Roseau to be nanny-raised.
The young colt also struck trouble when he required surgery on a fetlock. Bissett still praises the “excellent” job done by the Scone Equine Hospital’s Troy Butt, but the matter contributed to a somewhat flat sale result.
“Our vet said the procedure went fine and he wouldn’t have a problem, but the vets at the sale failed him,” Bissett said.
Pulse Racing and Pinhook Bloodstock were assured enough by Butt’s assessment to buy the colt for $95,000, with Bissett and Woodford-Smith keeping a small share.
With $850,000 in the bank so far, they’ve been more than rewarded for their faith and can look forward to more happy days ahead – most likely back up the straight at the course his family has been gracing for almost a century.