11 minute read
Just Capital
Ronan Groome chats with Ger O’Neill of Capital Stud, now standing six thoroughbred stallions including the recently repatriated Authorized
THERE WERE TWO GROUPS types of people during the Covid pandemic and it doesn’t take long to realise which group Ger O’Neill belonged.
The County Kilkenny native is best known in the sport horse sector. He has a masterful reputation for producing young horses through his Castlefield Sport Horses operation, which stands stallions and rears horses for competition at the highest level in the sector.
Individually, he has won three Gold medals at the World Breeding Championships for young horses –a monumental achievement.
He has won multiple Nations Cups riding for Ireland, continues to compete at five-star international shows and has produced horses who have gone on to compete at the Olympics.
When Covid came in and everything slowed down to a near halt, O’Neill wasn’t one to sit around and wait.
“My friend Darragh McCarthy thought we should buy a stallion,” he recalls. “It was just an idea!
“We couldn’t do a whole lot with the showjumping so I suppose it got us thinking of what we could be doing. I had the facilities to stand a stallion so we just went for it really.
“I’ve rode in point-to-points myself and I used to ride out for Mags Mullins. I’ve always followed the breeding of thoroughbreds, not as closely as I am now, but I was always interested. Hunting Horn cam on the market and we had him boguht before we' even thought about it too much. He stood here and that's how we started.
“It definitely wasn’t something we set out to do following a long-term plan, but since we’ve started Capital Stud, it has grown wings and it’s something I really enjoy.”
Now looking more at things from a business perspective, he adds: “Of course, it has to be financially viable. In the first few years it was important that we had a different source of income. We sold some good showjumpers who have gone on to European and Olympic level, which was a big help.
“That was probably key to the beginnings of it. It’s going well and you’d imagine in the future it’s a nice business to be in.”
It’s going well alright because in just the space of four years, Capital Stud is now standing six sires. The latest two acquisitions could not be further apart on the stallion spectrum – Castle Star and Authorized – but they are both exciting and intriguing for that alone and speak of the ambition of O’Neill and Co, who continue to stand Hunting Horn alongside Alkumait, Mirage Dancer and Triple Threat.
Another key in the fast progression of Capital has been outside investment from some of the important personalities in the industry, which is a sure sign of the regard in which O’Neill is held.
McCarthy, the leading point-topoint handler Donnchadh Doyle, fellow showjumper Greg Broderick and Jerry Horan of Paragon Bloodstock are just some of the names in the group who have been more than happy to back the man financially.
“I have known Donnchadh for a long, long time,” O’Neill says. “We would have been in Goresbridge together years ago with showjumpers, and I’d known the Doyle lads for years. Obviously we were on two different paths, Donnchadh was on the point-to-point road and I was jumping.
“With Triple Threat, I asked Donnchadh if he knew the horse?
“He said he’d bought two expensive stores, that he thought a lot of them and he asked to get involved. Donnchadh has a great knowledge and great contacts in the industry so he’s a great man to have on board.
“I own the majority in most of the stallions and we have different people invested here and there. It’s great to have that support from various people.
“The day-to-day running is down to us, but then the decisions of buying and selling stallions, what mares are covered and various other things on that scale are group things. They are obviously important decisions, but it has always been done in a nice and easy way – when the lads ring you, you’d always enjoy talking to them.
“It’s a situation in which everybody involved understands the business. They understand the way things develop with stallions and that is key.”
Perhaps the biggest decision yet took place at the end of last year with the acquisition of the 20-year-old Authorized, who was residing in Turkey.
O’Neill admits it was a long drawn-out process that required persistence and patience just to take the very sizeable risk on the sire of Tiger Roll and current Grand National favourite I Am Maximus.
In O’Neill’s eyes, the reward was too valuable not to explore every avenue to make it happen. The end result has worked out and the group has a stallion at Capital, who, even in the twilight of his stud career, could shake up a sales market that last year was dominated by Blue Bresil and Walk In The Park.
“It all started through a chance meeting with a Turkish man based here in Ireland,” O’Neill recalls. “He came in here to look at a horse and I asked about Authorized and whether he’d think there was any chance to buy him and he said no. But he did put us in touch with someone in the Turkish Jockey Club, but again straight away the answer was no. We even enquired about leasing him but it was no again.
“Eventually after going back and forth they decided they might give us a price, but then we found out we couldn’t get any insurance on him because he is 20.
“So this process went on for six to nine months and at one point we just decided, let’s go over and have a look at him. He looked in good order, so we decided to just go and buy him without insurance.
“There are a few of us involved. Authorized is such a brilliant stallion and the market wants him and it just felt right to bring him back to Ireland. Everybody sort of agreed that if it doesn’t work we wouldn’t talk about it again and just move on!
“But, so far, everything has gone well with mares scanning in-foal, so we’re a bit more relaxed now than we were at the beginning.”
O’Neill was quoted as saying the move to get Authorized was “either cracked or clever.”
He laughs at that assertion now. Perhaps it’s a bit of both – he admits himself that it would be very unusual to buy a stallion without insurance – but as they say nothing ventured, nothing gained.
O’Neill has shown a tremendous nous for the economics of horse trading and development, be it on the sports horse side and now with thoroughbreds, also. One feels he will need all of that intuition and business sense in this project, but he is already seeing the positive signs of having such a wellestablished sire at Capital.
“It’s a little bit of a day-by-day thing, but people have their mares booked in,” he explains. “We haven’t taken a huge amount of mares to be covered. We’d love to have around 100 pregnancies. That would be fantastic. He just covers two mares a day, maybe he’ll get to three but at the moment we’re happy with two and he is happy.
“If we stood him very commercially he’d have a huge book of mares, but we have him on a reasonably high fee and that probably keeps the numbers manageable.
“I think people are genuinely happy that the horse is back in Ireland. Obviously the Irish breeders as well, because there’s a lot of talk about the impact of the French-breds at Irish sales, so to have this sort of stallion in Ireland is a huge help, and will help more for the breeding of the future.
“Authorized three-year-olds are averaging €100,000. There were 13 sold last year for around €109,000 between Ireland and France. The market is very high. People have gone to Turkey and brought them back. There are a few going to the Derby Sale and the bigger store sales this year.
“The market is more challenging I suppose, and people really want quality, so that’s why we were pushed towards Authorized, to have a stallion like him. It means breeders are not worried if they are going to a sale with a foal by Authorized, they know there are going to be customers for it.
“We’ve spoken to a lot of different breeders and some of the best breeders in Ireland have been here to see him, and have also been taken by Triple Threat and Mirage Dancer and had their mares covered, so you can see the positive effect there as well.”
The impact of French-bred horses on the Irish NH sales markets is pertinent one.
It was discussed in detail at the early spring’s packed-out Irish Thoroughbred Breeders Association National Hunt Breeding Seminar where there was also a strong urge from a panel of well-respected voices for breeders to diversify their selection of stallions, amid the aforementioned domination of Blue Bresil and Walk In The Park stock at last autumn’s foal sales.
THAT, IT HAS TO BE SAID, is easier said than done, and O’Neill can see it from both sides.
“I think that viewpoint is absolutely right, but the problem is that if you have a group of foals to sell every year and you don’t have customers for them then the fun soon goes out of it and you could go broke,” he says.
“If you don’t have unlimited resources it’s very difficult to stay going. If you don’t breed commercially it is difficult to stay in breeding.
“The breeders are very resilient and they’re good people and they’ll always try to stay going but we all have to think a bit commercially as well as thinking about breeding a racehorse. In the end the market defines what people breed and who’s going to make money or not.
“That has probably been one of the biggest learnings since I started. There is definitely a certain type of horse who will sell well at the sales, and if a breeder or a stallion owner wants to stand a stallion or cover a mare who is going to breed a racehorse but not necessarily one for the market – that can be quite difficult and challenging at times.
“The sales scene can be a very harsh place.”
WITH THE FAST-SCALE development of Capital Stud coming alongside O’Neill’s already highly successful sport horse operation, and indeed three young children, you’d wonder how he has any time left in the day at all.
“That is a good question!” he asserts. “You get up in the morning and you do all you can do on that day. There is always stuff to do. We have the thoroughbred stallions now and we still have a lot of showjumpers. I’ve 40 horses. Jason Foley, who is based in France at the minute, he rides for me and he was placed in the Grand Prix recently.
“I’ve four different riders riding for me, and then I ride myself when I have time. I’ve probably taken a step back from riding, but that was probably a natural progression.
“We’ve a few horses in training with Philip Rothwell, as well. I’d like to have a couple of horses for the point-to-points and, in general, we’d like to get out and support breeders who’ve used our stallions.
“We’re also really excited about Castle Star standing here. It’s a big year for him and 20 breeding rights have been sold to him. He won his Group 2 at The Curragh on the bridle and he was unlucky not to win a Middle Park – he’s exciting now as a stallion.”
Fast, ever progressing and ambitious. You get the feeling in two years’ time Capital Stud could well be operating at a significantly higher level again, but everything is going well at the moment.
“We enjoy it and when you enjoy your work, it doesn’t really feel like work. We’re keen to keep going forward and hopefully that will be the case over the next few years.”
