Double act

John and Tanya Gunther, the father and daughter team at Glennwood Farm, bred both a Triple Crown and a Royal Ascot winner in 2018

Melissa Bauer-Herzog finds the secrets to their bloodstock success

It’s likely when John Gunther was attending races at the old Exhibition Park in his native Canada he never dreamed of becoming a thoroughbred breeder – let alone hitting the heights he has.

But the purchase of a horse for a girlfriend has led to a lifelong obsession. The obsession paid off in 2018 when he became the first breeder to produce a US Triple Crown winner and Royal Ascot winner in the same year when Justify and Without Parole achieved the feat in 2018.

“When I worked on the waterfront in Vancouver [British Columbia], I used to attend the races at Exhibition Park – now

Hastings – on the weekends from time to time and that usually involved blowing my entire pay cheque gambling on the horses!” he smiles.

“Then when I was dating Tanya’s mother, I bought her a jumping horse. This horse was a thoroughbred mare and ultimately a family friend in the horse business encouraged me to breed her and the resulting foal was my first homebred. He won a couple of races at the start of his career and so I was hooked.”

Gunther’s obsession led to buying a farm with some partners in Versailles, Kentucky and, keeping true to his Canadian roots, it was named after a creek near his children’s elementary school in British Columbia.

He ultimately bought out his partners and expanded the property to include the broodmare division.

That division saw Justify and Belmont Stakes fourth Vino Rosso sharing pastures – the pair grew up together from the time they were foaled to selling at the 2016 Keeneland September Yearling Sale.

“As a yearling, Vino Rosso was goodnatured and more easy going than Justify,” recalls Tanya. “Justify was a dominant personality, always making his presence known and approaching life with an abundance of energy. With Justify, we always had to take care not to let our arms become part of his breakfast or dinner!”

After following in her father’s footsteps into investment banking and working in London for many years, Tanya Gunther made the decision to swap her career to the horse industry when she took up the reins managing Glennwood.

Her father is quick to credit her for the mating decisions that led to producing horses such as Justify and Vino Rosso, but Tanya deflates that praise and says the choices are made jointly between the pair with her father responsible for the mating that produced Without Parole.

“I spend a lot of time analysing stallions, evaluating the pedigree cross and considering the physical match between the mare and stallion,” she says. “My father and I then have a back and forth discussion on each mating idea until we agree on a stallion for each mare.

Without Parole

“A lot of the matings of Without You Babe are about quality. My Dad has always wanted to send whatever mare he could to Frankel, and she was obviously one we’ve held high hopes for.

“Marozia was a foundation mare for us and Dad believed in Without You Babe even though she was unraced. I had actually watched her in training and knew she had talent, but she had an injury that forced her into breeding instead of showing what she could do on the racetrack.

“Believing in her as one of our top potential broodmares, breeding to Frankel, it made a lot of sense and physically it made a lot of sense, too.”

One of Tanya’s talents is finding bargain stallions before they hit big – during both Scat Daddy’s and Curlin’s quieter years she picked the stallions out for Justify’s dam Stage Magic and for Mythical Bride, the dam of Vino Rosso.

As a result, Justify was produced on a $35,000 fee, while Vino Rosso was bred on a $25,000 fee. After the work she puts into analysing stallions, Tanya says how rewarding it has been to see the stallions then reach new heights.

“It’s so hugely rewarding because I put so much time into it,” she says. “Sometimes you put a lot of time into something and at first you don’t succeed – there have been times when my dad will call me ‘over analytical’.

“But I like analysis and I like thinking about it. There’s also something about your feelings and your experience and your instincts that you can’t ignore, so I try not to do that.”

Only days after becoming the newest breeder of a Triple Crown winner due to spotting Scat Daddy’s value, the Gunthers jumped on a plane to England to watch their other undefeated three-year-old Without Parole run as favourite in the St. James’s Palace Stakes (G1).

After Justify won the Triple Crown, Tanya thought their luck would have been all used up so she tried to temper her expectations.

“When Justify won the Belmont, one of the first thoughts that crossed my mind after the hubbub was done was ‘it’s too good to be true it can’t happen that we also win at Royal Ascot,’” she said.

“I went there trying to manage my expectations a bit. It was only when he was coming down the stretch that I was like ‘Holy crap, we just might do this!’

“I could see he was hitting the front and then we see Gustav Klimt coming and I was thinking ‘just hold on, just go’ and then when he crossed the finish line in front it was like ‘wow, I can’t believe it. We did it, he did it, they did it.’ It’s just unbelievable, it’s hard to think that it actually happened.”

For Gunther Snr, who has steadfastly kept to his word that winning at Royal Ascot would be a bigger deal to him than the Triple Crown, winning the St. James’s Palace was a dream come true.

“The entire journey I have experienced with Without Parole has played a huge role in how I felt about winning the St. James’s Palace at Royal Ascot.

“My tremendous appreciation for Frankel followed by the acceptance of Without You Babe by Juddmonte to breed to him; it was the start of this dream back in 2013-2014.

“I had been attending Royal Ascot for years as a fan and we would often talk about how great it would be just to have a runner during the week.

“So, to have Without Parole entered in one of the most prestigious races of the meeting, was like a dream come true as well. Then for him to actually win it... I was in a fog of delighted disbelief and I am still shaking my head about what an incredible experience it has all been, especially with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex presenting the trophies.”

“Royal Ascot is one of my favourite meetings anywhere in the world – if not the favourite. So to be there with my first runner as both owner and breeder and to win it was an unparalleled experience.

“This is not meant to take anything away from Justify and his Triple Crown accomplishment. This was another dream come true as his breeder. I just feel so fortunate to have bred both Justify and Without Parole and to still be the owner of Without Parole.

“I never really wanted to sell Justify as a yearling so this probably factored into my thinking when I set the reserve for Without Parole at Tattersalls in October.”

For Gunther it was also a validation of the choice he’d made to send some mares to Europe years earlier, even those who, at first glance, look more Dirt-bred types.

Without You Babe is a half-sister to the multiple Grade 1 winner Stay Thirsty and Belmont Stakes (G1) runner-up Andromeda’s Hero and she is the dam of Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile (G1) hero Tamarkuz, but he points to several indications that showed she’d succeed in a Turf-dominant breeding pool.

“I felt there was a shift in stallion power from the US to Europe at the time we started sending mares to Europe,” he explains. “Galileo and Dubawi were making

"Galileo and Dubawi were making headlines routinely and I loved the idea of dipping into that gene pool and trying to breed to the best stallions in Europe.

“Without You Babe is by Lemon Drop Kid, who has excelled as a Turf sire, and so there was an element of Turf potential inherent in her pedigree from him, as well as from her dam Marozia.

“Marozia produced top Dirt horses, but was by Storm Bird so represented Turf potential as well.”

Most of Glennwood’s horses go through the auction ring, but buyers will have to wait a little longer to try and dip into Without Parole’s immediate family as Without You Babe had fillies the following two years after producing Without Parole. The Gunthers are keeping both.

It is possible buyers will have a chance at Justify’s Will Take Charge half-brother this month at the Keeneland September Sale, but even though Gunther entered him in the sale, as of the time of this writing in August, he was thinking of pulling the colt.

“I have tentatively entered him in the Keeneland September Sale, but I have wanted to retain him since he was a foal, so there is still a good chance that I scratch him,” he says.

“The foal half-brother by Pioneerof The Nile is doing very well. He is an athletic type with a strong personality and although he doesn’t look like Justify there are elements of his personality that remind me of him.”

As for future horses to watch from the Glennwood racing stable, Without Parole’s Kingman half-sister She’s Got You looks as though she may add to her dam’s outstanding produce record sooner rather than later.

“It’s easy days still, we don’t get rolling early,” says Tanya. “I think She’s Got You is an interesting one. She’s done enough in pre-training where you can see some talent there.

“Hopefully, we’ll see her at the back-end of this year. She’s one that stands out for me and she’s by Kingman. He is nicely off to a good start so that gives you a feeling of hope that the stallion can do it and the filly herself has shown a bit of promise.”

Glennwood only consigns its US yearlings at the Keeneland September Sale and has 19 lots catalogued this September, including a full-sister to Grade 1 winner Mo Town, as well as the second foal out of a grand-daughter of Toussaud, and a colt out of a half-sister to Grade 1 winner Materiality.

It’ll be hard to top 2018 for Glennwood, but with foals in the pasture and potential matings to Justify to be planned there’s no doubt they’ll be having success for years to come.

Vino Rosso