9 minute read
Empire builders
Japan’s K I Farm and Northern Farm both enjoyed fabulous seasons in 2020. Martin Stevens, via Zoom, recounts the year’s racing with Tomoyuki Nakamura of K I Farm and Shingo Hashimoto of Northern Farm
ONE OF THE MOST powerful racing and breeding operations in Japan outside of the Yoshida empire is the Nakamura family’s K I Farm.
The name should be familiar to fans of the sport and members of the bloodstock industry in the western hemisphere as they are the notable breeders of world champion sprinter and young sire Lord Kanaloa and former Japanese highweight two-year-old Danon Premium, who ran third to Addeybb in the Ranvet Stakes (G1) last year.
K I Farm is also a regular buyer of elite broodmare prospects at sales in Europe and North America, and among its purchases this past winter were the Grade 1 Clement L Hirsch Stakes heroine Ollie’s Candy for $1.65 million at Keeneland and Photo Call’s three-parts sister Swan River for 130,000gns at Tattersalls.
December also brought the crowning glory of the Nakamura family’s involvement in the sport so far – the homebred Danon Smash emulated his sire Lord Kanoloa by winning in the Hong Kong Sprint (G1).
Lord Kanaloa, who won the Sha Tin event twice among six top-level triumphs, was raced by K I Farm’s Tomoyuki Nakamura under the Lord Horse Club banner, whereas Danon Smash is one of many high-class horses who bear the “Danon” insignia and carry the colours of Masahiro Noda’s Danox Co Ltd.
“K I Farm opened in 1987, and at that point there were only five broodmares in the operation,” says Tomoyuki Nakamura, who is often seen at the sales in Europe and America. “We now have around 70 broodmares, as well as 60 yearlings in pre-training and 110 two-year-olds and older horses in training.”
Lord Kanaloa was the result of K I Farm sending its winning mare Lady Blossom, a daughter of Storm Cat and Beldame and Gazelle Stakes scorer Saratoga Dew, to Kingmambo’s champion son King Kamehameha in his third season standing at the Shadai Stallion Station.
The mating was a no-brainer, according to Nakamura.
“King Kamehameha was one of the top stallions in Japan at the time, and our philosophy is always to breed the best to the best; it’s as simple as that,” he says.
Lady Blossom, another campaigned by the Lord Horse Club, produced six winners in total, also including the Listed-placed Lord Balius, and she is now an honoured retiree at K I Farm.
Danon Smash under Ryan Moore wins the Hong Kong Sprint emulating his ire Lord Kanaloa (below)
“She has a strong personality and has always been the leader among her group of mares in the paddocks,” says Nakamura. “She had to be the best and in charge when she was grazing and her progeny perhaps inherited that trait.”
He recalls Lord Kanaloa as a young horse: “He was very easy to deal with and had no issues. He was small in physique but very strong and muscular.”
Lord Kanaloa put those physical gifts to good use on the track, not least when hammering one of Europe’s best sprinters Sole Power by 5l to take his second Hong Kong Sprint in his racing swansong.
Lord Kanaloa is following his sire King Kamehameha by excelling in the breeding shed.
Danon Smash, a six-year-old from his first crop, is one of five Grade 1 winners for him, a group headed by Almond Eye, who has nine elite victories to her name, including a second Japan Cup (G1) achieved in November.
It is not hard to see why the stallion is excelling in his second career, as he was such a superb athlete in the first; but, all the same, Nakamura offers a little extra insight.
“First and foremost, I think he is just excellent at passing down speed,” he says. “But another thing is that his offspring are generally gentle and easy to handle.”
K I Farm is in the envious position of owning around half the breeding rights to Lord Kanaloa, whose 2021 fee of ¥15 million – around £106,000 or €119,000 – makes him the most expensive resident of the Shadai Stallion Station.
Danon Smash’s dam Spinning Wildcat visited Lord Kanaloa in his first season at stud in 2014, after she was exported from the US and gave birth to the Tapit filly she was carrying when bought at the preceding winter’s Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale for $600,000.
Spinning Wildcat, a four-year-old at the time of her purchase, is a winning daughter of Hard Spun and the multiple Grade 1-winning Kris S mare Hollywood Wildcat, also dam of the high-class pair War Chant and Ivan Denisovich.
Incidentally, Danon Smash can claim that one of his paternal great-granddams (Saratoga Dew) and his maternal granddam (Hollywood Wildcat) were champion threeyear-old fillies in the US.
Nakamura confirms it was Spinning Wildcat’s dazzling pedigree that encouraged him to add her to K I’s broodmare band.
“Yes, the reason was that solid pedigree,” he says. “She is out of a truly great mare in Hollywood Wildcat and her half-brother War Chant also sired several high-ranking horses.
“There was all that, and then when I inspected her she looked as though she had the physique to become a wonderful broodmare, so I bought her!”
Danon Smash has vindicated the purchase in no uncertain terms. His Hong Kong Sprint success may have been his first at Grade 1 level, but he had already collected a brace of Grade 2s and four Grade 3s, and twice finished placed in the Sprinters Stakes.
“It was extraordinary that Danon Smash won the Hong Kong Sprint because it was always our goal to win the race again with one of Lord Kanaloa’s progeny.
“It’s the whole reason I bought Spinning Wildcat and bred her to Lord Kanaloa. It was an ambitious target but we’ve achieved it!”
Spinning Wildcat also has a three-year-old filly, two-year-old filly and yearling colt by Lord Kanaloa, and was covered by Heart’s Cry last year.
She keeps exalted company at K I Farm, as her paddock mates include the aforementioned Ollie’s Candy and Swan River as well as Canadian Horse of the Year Wonder Gadot (bought for $2m at Fasig-Tipton in 2019), Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup heroine La Coronel (cost $1.5m at Fasig-Tipton in 2018), Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and Belmont Oaks winner Catch A Glimpse (a $3m buy at Fasig-Tipton in 2017) and dual Woodbine Grade 2 scorer Lexie Lou (cost $1m at Keeneland in 2016).
It’s safe to say that with K I Farm continuing to invest in such quality bloodlines, Lord Kanaloa and his son Danon Smash won’t be the last of the stud’s graduates we see excelling on the international racing scene.
Northern Farm 2020: Annus Mirabilis
KATSUMI YOSHIDA’s Northern Farm is one of the world’s foremost breeding operations; a regular purchaser of the most in-demand broodmares available on any continent with access to some of the best global stallions at its fingertips.
But even when taking all that into account, the extent of its success in 2020 was breathtaking. In fact, it’s difficult to know where to start describing it all.
There was Gran Alegria, the outstanding five-year-old who won the Yasuda Kinen (G1), the Sprinters Stakes (G1) and the Mile Championship (G1); she is by the late multiple champion sire Deep Impact out of dual Grade 1-winning miler Tapitsfly, bought by Yoshida for $1.85 million at Keeneland in 2012.
Another admirable older mare bred by Northern Farm and campaigned by the affiliated Sunday Racing Co is Lucky Lilac, by Orfevre out of privately purchased Ashland Stakes winner Lilacs And Lace. She took her Grade 1 haul to four by winning the Osaka Hai (G1) and Queen Elizabeth II Cup (G1) last year.
Fierement – Sunday Racing Co’s son of Deep Impact and Premio Lydia Tesio heroine Lune D’Or, a €750,000 Arqana December acquisition in 2010 – gained his second success in the Tenno Sho (Spring) (G1) and has now been retired to stud.
There were even prestigious Grade 1 victories for Northern Farmbred siblings within the space of weeks as Chrono Genesis, a 6l winner of the Takarazuka Kinen (G1) earlier in the season, landed the Arima Kinen for Sunday Racing Co just a fortnight after her year-older half-sister Normcore had taken the Hong Kong Cup (G1) in the colours of Seiichi Iketani.
Chrono Genesis, by Arc hero Bago, and Normcore, a daughter of world champion Harbinger, are out of Kurofune’s winning daughter Chronologist.
It was not all about the older horses either, as the Northern Farm/Sunday Racing Co axis won the Asahi Hai Futurity (G1), one of Japan’s leading two-year-old contests, with Grenadier Guards, a Frankel colt out of Wavell Avenue, a Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) winner sold privately to Japan.
Northern Farm is also the proud breeder of the awesome Almond Eye who won the Victoria Mile (G1), the Tenno Sho (Autumn) (G1) and her second Japan Cup (G1) in 2020.
Lucky Lilac and Mirco Demuro after winning the Grade 1 Osaka Hai. It was a Northern Farm-bred one-two with Chrono Genesis in second
The Silk Racing-owned daughter of Lord Kanaloa was retired at the end of the year as the winner of 11 of her 15 starts, nine at the highest level, and with more than £13 million in prize-money earnings.
To cap it all, Northern Farm also bred the first three home in several of Japan’s most competitive Grade 1 events in the past 12 months. In the Tenno Sho (Autumn) it was thanks to Almond Eye, Fierement and Chrono Genesis; and in the Yasuda Kinen it was down to Gran Alegria beating Almond Eye and Indy Champ.
In the Mile Championship it was the Northern Farm graduates Gran Alegria, Indy Champ and Admira Mars responsible for the tricast; and in the Queen Elizabeth II Cup Lucky Lilac beat Salacia and Loves Only You completing a clean sweep.
And get this: Northern Farm bred the first five home in the Arima Kinen – Chrono Genesis, Salacia, Fierement, Lucky Lilac and World Premiere.
Phew! The stud might be accustomed to high achievement but 2020 was something else altogether.
“Indeed, we were fortunate to be very successful last year,” says spokesperson Shingo Hashimoto with some understatement.
He reports that Northern Farm owns more than 900 mares. “And we expect that number to grow even more,” he adds ominously.
Almond Eye wins her second Japan Cup. The Northern Farm-bred daughter of Lord Kanaloa has now been retired to stud. She is the highestearning Japanese horse ever having picked up the equivalent of £13.6m from 15 races with nine Group and Grade 1 victories
If there was one bittersweet note to Northern Farm’s outstanding success last year it was that so many of its celebrated alumni are by, or related to, Shadai Stallion Station’s exceptional sires Deep Impact and King Kamehameha – both of whom were bred by the operation but died before their time in 2019. “It was indeed very sad that we lost Deep Impact as well as King Kamehameha, since we produced both horses and they were the best two stallions over the past years,” says Hashimoto. “Deep Impact was certainly a legendary horse in Japanese history and will remain as such for sure.
“But we are also very excited with the young stallions as well. Epiphaneia, for example, has produced a Triple Tiara winner in Daring Tact from his first crop.”
Epiphaneia, a Northern Farm-bred son of Symboli Kris S and half-brother to champions Leontes and Saturnalia, has been widely touted as Almond Eye’s first port of call now that she has retired to the paddocks for Silk Racing.
“And don’t forget Duramente and Maurice were ranked second and third behind Deep Impact in the leading two-year-old sires’ lists with their first crops in 2020,” adds Hashimoto.
Pixie Knight, a Northern Farm-bred son of Maurice, carried Silk Racing’s colours to victory in the Grade 3 Nikkan Sports Sho Shinzan Kinen at Chukyo in early January to give the stud an auspicious start to 2021.
