Interesting Article on Storm Cat's Career - long though!

[S_N]

Copied and pasted from the TDN - Thoroughbred Daily News

STORM CAT RETIRED FROM STUD DUTY
Overbrook Farm=s Storm Cat (Storm Bird--Terlingua, by Secretariat), North America's Leading Active Sire by Progeny Earnings and two-time Leading Sire, has been retired from stud duty due to declining fertility, according to Overbrook's Manager of Stallion Operations, Ric Waldman. "It was a privilege to be able to manage all but two years of his stallion career and to see him grow in popularity, value and success, from a stallion who was not desirable and not popular to the highest-priced stallion in the world, "Waldman told the TDN. "A decline was expected because we saw decline last year, and obviously he's a year older. We didn't expect the precipitous decline that we saw this season. His in-foal rate last year was 70 percent, but he was erratic throughout the year." According to Waldman, the 5-year-old has gotten three mares in foal this season. From 18 crops to race, Storm Cat has sired 12 champions, 32 Grade I/Group 1 stakes winners and the earners of more than $111 million. He stood the 2008 season for $300,000. According to Waldman, Storm Cat will remain at Overbrook Farm.

Winner at the Highest Level on the Racetrack...
Owned and bred by William T. Young and trained by Jonathan Sheppard, Storm Cat faced the starter only eight times in his career, but certainly made the most of his opportunities. The Pennsylvania-bred graduated at historic Saratoga in his second career start as a two-year-old in 1985, then added an allowance at the Meadowlands. He crossed the wire first in the World Appeal S., but was demoted to second due to interference. The dark bay posted a career high when victorious in the GI Young America S. at the Big M, then came up a nose short of Tasso when second in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile at Aqueduct in his two-year-old finale. Early in his three-year-old season Storm Cat underwent arthroscopic surgery to remove bone chips in his knee, and returned off a lengthy layoff to win an allowance at the Meadowlands in late October. He only started one more time following that tally, placing fourth in Laurel's Annapolis S. the following month. Back in training at four, Storm Cat developed inflamation in one of his forelegs, and although it was too late for him to make the 1987 breeding season, Young made the decision to stop on the colt. Storm Cat retired to Overbrook with a record of 8-4-3-0 and $570,610 in earnings.

A Champion in the Breeding Shed...
Storm Cat sired no fewer than 12 champions during his illustrious breeding career, including six-time Group 1 winner and GI Breeders' Cup Classic runner-up Giant's
Causeway. Giant's Causeway, champion freshman sire in Europe in 2004, stands at
Coolmore's Ashford Stud for $125,000. Storm Cat sired six two-year-old champions. Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies' winners Storm Flag Flying and Sweet Catomine were honored as champion juvenile fillies in the United States in 2002 and 2004, respectively. Hold that Tiger, winner of the G1 Gran Criterium, and MG1SW One Cool Cat were champion two-year-old colts in Europe in 2002 and 2003. Silken Cat, subsequent dam of champion Speightstown, was Canada's Champion two-year-old filly in 1995 and Denebola was the 2003 highweight two-year-old filly in France. Black
Minnaloushe, hero of the G1 Irish 2000 Guineas and G1 St. James's Palace S., was the 2001 highweight threeyear-old colt in Ireland. Champions Ambitious Cat, Catrail, Mistle Cat and Munaaji round out the dozen.

Moving Up His Mares...
Daughters of Storm Cat have gone on to produce a total of 69 stakes winners, 10 of those in Group/Grade I company, and seven champions, including Speightstown (Gone West) and Folklore (Tiznow) in the United States and European highweight Mujahid (Danzig). Storm Cat is also the broodmare sire of Group/Grade I winners Buddha (Unbridled's Song); Sky Mesa (Pulpit); Nobiz Like Shobiz (Albert the Great); and Unfurl the Flag (Bertrando). He is the broodmare sire of South American Group 1 winners Rocking Trick (Arg) (Phone Trick); Randy Cat (Arg) (Roy); and Hail Glory (Brz) (Minstrel Glory). Storm Cat is also the broodmare sire of an additional 21 group/graded winners worldwide.

As Blue As The Grass...
If ever there was a stallion destined to succeed based on his pedigree, it was Storm Cat. The handsome dark bay was produced by Storm Bird, who was purchased for $1,000,000 by Robert Sangster at Keeneland July in 1979. Storm Bird went on to win all five of his starts at two, including the G1 Dewhurst S. over stalwarts To-Agori-Mou (Ire) and Miswaki and, based on that form, the son of Northern Dancer was procalimed the top rated juvenile in both England and Ireland in 1980. Storm Cat’s dam, Terlingua, brought equally impressive credentials to the table. Campaigned by trainer D.Wayne Lukas and owners Larry French and
Barry Beal, the fleet filly was by Triple Crown hero Secretariat out of the bluehen mare Crimson Saint, whose most notable offspring included Grade 1/Group 1 winner Royal Academy and multiple graded stakes winner Pancho Villa. Winner of the GII Hollywood
Lassie, GII Del Mar Debutante S. and Nursery S. in 1978, Terlingua also scored against the colts in the GII Hollywood Juvenile Championship S. before finishing runner-up in the GI Frizette S. and GII Alcibiades S. At three, the chestnut filly added the GIII Santa Ynez S.
and was second in the GI Santa Susana S. Businessman and philanthropist William T. Young, who was responsible for developing Big Top peanut butter--later named Jif--entered the racing game in the early 70's and began buying property, the initial building blocks of present-day Overbrook Farm. Looking to expand his broodmare band, the Kentucky native came upon a stroke of luck in the early >80s. Dr. Bill Lockridge, who was operating Ashford Stud in partnership with Robert Hefner at the time, offered Young a package
of three young mares through various partnerships. Heading the group was G1 Prix de L’Arc de Triomphe heroine Three Troikas (Fr), GSW Cinegita and Terlingua. While Three Troikas was inconsistent in the breeding shed, Cinegita produced a pair of stakes winners, as
well as the filly Starlet Storm, evenutal dam of juvenile filly champion Flanders and Granddam of champion three-year-old filly Surfside. Young purchased 50 percent of the group initially, but later bought out the remaining 50-percent interest in the mares when Ashford encountered financial difficulties.

In the spring of 1983, Terlingua foaled Storm Cat at Derry Meeting Farm in Pennsylvania, where she was boarded while she awaiting a scheduled visit to Northern Dancer in neighboring Maryland. Raised at Derry Meeting, Storm Cat was entered in the Keeneland July sale a year later, but was subsequently withdrawn when he tested positive for equine viral arteritis. Opting to race the colt instead of offer him at Keeneland September, Young sent the colt to trainer Jonathan Sheppard.

A Sale Sire Like Few Others...
Now, after the champions, the Classic winners and the Breeders’ Cup heros, it might be hard to remember the time when Storm Cat was just another freshman sire, a new kid on the block whose offspring were trying to prove their worth on the track. And in the sales ring. Also, after the many dozens of seven-figure yearlings, it may be equally hard to remember a time when Storm Cat’s youngsters weren’t the valued commodites they are today. It was 1990 when Storm Cat's first yearlings hit the sales. It was hardly love at first sight for buyers, as many shared the conformation faults of their father, namely offset knees. While his youngsters where far from shunned, the 13 that found new homes averaged a modest $54,769. That group included stakes winner Blue Tiger, Storm Cat's top-priced yearling that year at $160,000 (the only one to eclipse six figures), as well
as multiple Grade I heroine November Snow, knocked down to Silverbrook Stable for just $35,000. D. Wayne Lukas, incidently, who would go on to be associated with Storm Cat's offspring perhaps more than any other trainer, was on the bandwagon early: he bought Meteor Storm out of that first crop for $67,000. That colt never won a stakes, but did have
the distinction of being one of Storm Cat's heartiest runners, making 100 starts and competing until he was 10. Storm Cat's first runners reached the races in 1991, and their immediate success meant Storm Cat’s second crop of sale horses was better received than the first, averaging $78,735. Darley bought that year's topper, Nebaal, for $375,000. Nebaal never made the races, but Darley did better with another Storm Cat it purchased
that year, Catrail. Knocked down for $250,000 as a KEESEP yearling in 1991, Catrail won a pair of group races as a three-year-old and was twice named highweighted sprinter in Great Britain. Crop number three would mark the last time Storm Cat yearlings would average less than $100,000. In 1992, 30 of his yearlings averaged a still-unspectacular $74,050. The group included Sardula, a $110,000 purchase by Pope McLean who would go on to capture
the 1995 GI Kentucky Oaks. Gainsborough stud landed Munaaji, later named champion sprinter in Germany, for $110,000. By 1993, Storm Cat had become a hot young sire,
and his fourth crop reflected the respect that buyers were giving to the son of Storm Bird. His yearling average improved to $109,500. A year later, a suberb group of horses averaged $136,903. Lukas acquired Hennessy, subsequent hero of the GI Hopeful S. and runner-up in the GI Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, for $500,000, easily the most money paid for a Storm Cat yearling up to that point. Sam-Son Farm had to go to only $95,000 to buy Silken Cat, who was named champion juvenile filly the following year in Canada. She would later go on to be the dam of champion sprinter Speightstown. In 1995, Storm Cat's yearling crop included the brilliant Sharp Cat (a $205,000 buy for Fox Hill Farms) and Tale of the Cat (knocked down to John Forbes for $375,000). The answer: Paragata King. The question: Who was
Storm Cat's first seven-figure yearling? Fusao Sekiguchi was the buyer of record when Paragata King was hammered down for $1.6 million at the 1996 Keeneland July Sale. The colt failed to live up to expectations, though, failing to hit the board in his lone start. Forestry became Storm Cat's second seven-figure horse in 1997, selling to Bob Baffert--agent for Aaron and Marie Jones--for $1.7 million (Exploit, who would later be trained by Baffert, RNA'd for $1.475 that year). The 1997 season also marked the first time Storm
Cat's yearling average eclipsed the half-million mark. In 1998, five Storm Cat yearlings made seven figures as his average soared to $816,563. They were led by Saudi Poetry ($1.7 million), who validated her price tag for The Thoroughbred Corp. The $1.1 million
Magicalmysterycat earned her keep for Padua, as did the very talented Grade I winner High Yield, a $1.05-million acquisition by Coolmore's Demi O'Byrne. From there, it was onward and upward.

For the first time in 1999, his yearling average reached seven figures ($1,045,556). By 2000, Coolmore, which had acquired Tale of the Cat as a stallion prospect, was aggressively going after yearlings by Storm Cat, much in the same manner Coolmore
pricipals had gone after yearlings by Northern Dancer--Storm Cat's grandsire--three decades earlier. That was evidenced by Coolmore's purchased of Tasmanian Tiger, who came with an astounding $6.8-million price tag, in 2000. The next year, Coolmore purchased Van Nistelrooy for $6.4 million. And so it went over the next eight years that Storm Cat would solidify his status as one of the premier sale sires of all time. Of the top eight yearlings
ever sold by Keeneland, three are by Storm Cat--the $9.7 million Jalil, the $8.2 million Act Of Diplomacy (out of Awesome Humor, an unraced three-year-old of this year), and the
$8 million Mr. Sekiguchi. Storm Cat has also accounted for seven of the 10 highest-priced yearlings of all time at the Keeneneland September sale. Notably, Storm Cat's grandson The Green Monkey became the most expensive horse to ever sell at public auction on Demi O'Byrne's $16-million bid. Through Storm Cat's career thus far, a total of 413 of his yearlings have sold for $290,081,929, good for an average of $702,378 and a median of $300,000. More fireworks will undoubtedly follow, and after the last Storm Cat yearling goes through the ring sometime around September of 2010, a brilliant and lucrative
chapter will come to a close.

 

[seabiscuit]

Fascinating! Really enjoyed reading that, thank you for puttig it on line. Will be interesting to see if the green monkey is any good at stud!

 

[Laafet]

Interesting. On another note was at the TBA conference at Cheltenham a few years back and a vet talking about angular limb deformities said that Storm Cat was the stallion that often seemed to involved in foals with ALD. Although from experience of the ones we have they are ok, Timber Country's were far worse, always turning out on the near fore.

 

[S_N]

That is interesting! And I tell you something else about SC's, often they will scope poorly and have a tendency towards being sway backed! The SC yearling that was a 1/2 brother to '97 Breeders' Cup Juvenile victor Favorite Trick, was the worst example of this I ever saw with my own eyes.