By Bill Finley
At 76 and with none of his children particularly interested in racing, Stuart Janney, III had to make some decisions about the future of his racing and breeding operations. He didn't want to get out of the sport entirely and he also didn't want to breed mares whose foals won't get to the races for years. So he has decided to disperse his band at the Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale. There, he will sell 13 broodmares and two broodmare prospects. Among others, they are in foal to Good Magic, Life Is Good and Not This Time.
The consignor will be Claiborne Farm.
What's left will be his weanlings, yearlings and horses of racing age. He estimates that his holdings will consist of about 35 horses.
“I never considered leaving the sport,” he said. “This seemed to make the most sense. I asked the kids and asked if any one of them wanted to take this on. Their answer was no and it didn't surprise me. So I thought this made a lot of sense. I'll be just as involved with the racetrack for the next three or four years and maybe longer.”
Both sides of Janney's family have been involved with the sport since the 1920s. His mother and father, Stuart and Barbara Janney, owned and bred the ill-fated Ruffian.
Janney does not shop at the sales. Rather, he breeds to race, which he said, makes him a “dinosaur.”
“Things have changed,” he said. “When I started out 30% of horses or so went to the sales. Not anymore. I'm probably a little too old to change.
“I think what I'm doing makes the most sense,” he continued. “This is the part of the business that has been the toughest– breed to race. It's tougher to breed than sell. Depending on whether you're good at it or not, it's tougher than if you were picking them at the sales. Not too many people have done it like I did it. I really enjoy all the aspects of doing it the way I did it. I enjoyed figuring out the matings and I enjoyed the fact that I've seen successive generations of horses at the racetrack. I think [trainer] Shug [McGaughey] enjoyed that too, seeing their characteristics play out in future generations and getting excited about the foals.”
A dinosaur or not, he said he's always been comfortable with the way he approached the sport.
“I've always enjoyed that,” he said. “If you're breeding to race, every season is different. It's arranging the matings. It's seeing horses at various stages of their careers, seeing the new foals arrive. All the things that aren't part of your life if you are buying horses at the sale. Seeing successive generations of horses perform. Those kinds of things I will miss. On the other hand, life goes on.
“I've thought about this for a long time. There's a lot of emotion involved. I'm comfortable that I'm doing the right thing.”
In his role as Chairman of the Jockey Club, Janney has sometimes expressed his displeasure with how the sport was run. With HISA up and running–which the Jockey Club supported–he says he feels better about the game now than he has in some time.
“I'm less frustrated now,” he said. “If you had asked me back in 2012, I would have told you that I had a very dim view of what the racing commissions were doing. I didn't know that we'd get to where we are today. I feel pretty good about the safety aspect and the integrity aspect. The industry has a lot of challenges, what I call the financial aspects. It's really expensive to put on the show. It's really expensive to have good safety and good integrity. We have accomplished a lot and are in better shape to accomplish more because people are getting along better. Different entities are getting along with each other better than they have. I am less frustrated now than I was 10 years ago.”
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