I Remember 1993

Following about five years of practical work experience in Germany, Great Britain, the United States and Australia, 1993 was my first year as a freelance journalist on breeding topics and as a breeding advisor. I travelled to Newmarket in May on Guineas weekend and witnessed the scintillating performance put up by Zafonic (Gone West) when landing the 2000 Guineas, setting a new track record in the process. The unbeaten champion juvenile colt of 1992 looked magnificent in the parade ring and strode out every bit the champion he was. The race developed well for him and he made his move in the straight, accelerating into a fifth gear. The only one able to keep up was the Sadler's Wells colt Barathea (Ire) and he lost nothing in defeat. Barathea went on to further glory and both colts became prolific sires underlining the value of these Classic races.

This was also a very important year for German racing and breeding, as it was the Classic year of the exceptional crop of 1990 which proved to be one of the very best in domestic racing and breeding history. The German-bred colts Lando (Ger) (Acatenango {Ger}), Monsun (Ger) (Konigsstuhl {Ger}) and Sternkonig (Ire) (Kalaglow {Ire}), plus the British bred Kornado (GB) (Superlative {Ire}) emerged as internationally proven Group 1 winners, a great achievement for Germany which was then only beginning to make its presence felt at that level.

Gestut Ittlingen's homebred Lando wasn't precociously-bred, but won the Junioren-Preis and Preis des Winterfavoriten as a juvenile and oozed class all the way. At the beginning of his 3-year-old campaign, Lando was troubled by respiratory problems due to an infection and could not live up to expectations in the races prior to the Derby. Kept in the G1 Deutsches Derby, he returned to his best form with a bang on that first Sunday in July, claiming this premier Classic in great style by surging past Monsun and Sternkonig. The G2 German 2000 Guineas hero Kornado ended up in eighth place, a place ahead of the G2 Preis der Diana (German Oaks) heroine Arkona (Ger) (Aspros {Ger}).

Lando went on to further glory that year when landing the G1 Grosser Preis von Baden from the older Platini (Ger) (Surumu {Ger}) and collected a total of seven Group 1 victories in three countries culminating in his emphatic victory in the Japan Cup as a 5-year-old in 1995. His trainer, the almighty Heinz Jentzsch, was never much in favour of running his horses abroad, but he had conquered the G1 Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud in 1986 with Lando's sire Acatenango (Ger) (Surumu {Ger}) and the G1 Prix Jacques le Marois in 1986 with Lirung (Ger) (Connaught {GB}).

Lando went on to sire a total of seven Group 1 winners, but his contemporary and Deutsches Derby runner-up Monsun recorded a total of three Group 1 victories and sired a total of 67 group or graded-stakes winners including 22 at the highest level. Bred by Gestut Isarland and owned by Georg Baron von Ullmann, Monsun marks the most influential and prolific sire of German origin and was honoured as a “chef-de-race” sire during his lifetime. Monsun was an extremely consistent and honest racehorse, a virtue which he certainly passed on to his stock.

Gestut Rottgen's Deutsches Derby third Sternkonig, from the immediate family of the Arc hero Star Appeal (Ire) (Appiani II {Ity}) and the leading National Hunt sire Strong Gale (Ire) (Lord Gayle), won a total of four group races headed by the G1 Deutschland-Preis as a 4-year-old. He also became a successful sire with a Group 1 winner in Kallisto (Ger), while Kornado's exploits as a 3-year-old are headed by his victory against his elders in the G1 Deutschland-Preis. As a sire, he had three group winners.

This was also the year when Gestut Ravensberg's Frontal (Fr) mare Wurfbahn (Ger) foaled a strapping filly by Acatenango named Wurftaube (Ger). She recorded four group victories at three, including a runaway win in the G2 Deutsches St Leger. She revived the broodmare line of the almighty Alchimist (Ger) mare Waldrun (Ger), which had lain dormant since the exploits of the multiple Group 1 winner and leading sire Windwurf (Ger) (Kaiseradler {Ger}) in the mid-70s.

On an international level, it was Wurftaube's daughter Waldmark (Ger) (Mark of Esteem {Ire}), runner-up in the G2 Falmouth S. at Newmarket, who produced the G1 St Leger hero Masked Marvel (GB) (Montjeu {Ire}) and the G3 Prix Penelope scorer Waldlerche (GB) (Monsun {Ger}). The latter is, of course, the dam of Waldgeist (GB) (Galileo {Ire}) whose pedigree combines two leading German dam lines with the sire line of Sadler's Wells and a third leading German influence in Monsun (Ger). Nineteen ninety-three surely was a great year for German breeding and racing and in a certain way the beginning of much more to come.

   To read I Remember 1999 by Tom Frary, please click here.

   To read I Remember 1973 by Sean Cronin, please click here.