By Sue Finley
When Jon Clay bought Strong Incentive for his Alpha Delta Stables for $2.15 million at last year's Fasig-Tipton November Sale, she had already produced Grade III winner and track-record holder Highly Motivated (Into Mischief), now a stallion at Airdrie Stud; two-time Grade III winner Surge Capacity (Flintshire {GB}); and an up-and-coming `TDN Rising Star' named Ways and Means (Practical Joke), who had run second in the Grade I Spinaway Stakes. Within a month of his purchase, Surge Capacity won the Grade I Matriarch, and by the following summer, Ways and Means had established herself as a potential superstar, winning the Grade I Test at 3-5, and the GII Gallant Bloom at 2-5. Ways and Means will head into the Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Sprint as the likely favorite, and her dam will be one of the stars of the night at the November Sale two days later.
“It's hard to imagine a better producer in the world, much less on offer at public auction, than Strong Incentive,” said Fasig-Tipton president Boyd Browning of the 12-year-old mare. “She is also the rare mare who has produced a Grade I winner on turf and dirt.”
Clay, a cousin of Runnymede's late Catesby Clay, got into the breeding business somewhat later in his life. The New York City native bought his first horse in 2006 while maintaining a successful career in sports marketing. Seventeen years later, he is the breeder of the leading first-crop sire by winners, Vekoma, and of the two-time Breeders' Cup Sprint-winning champion Elite Power.
He said he realized early on that the best way to succeed was to invest in deep pedigrees at the top end of the market.
“I've been in the breeding business since 2007, and my goal has always been to be a commercial breeder,” said Clay. “Initially, I just wanted to try and see how the breeding business would work. So I bought three mares at my first sale back in 2006. And I just wanted to go slowly into it and see how it would work and see if it could be successful for me. And I realized after the first couple of years of acquiring mares that the best opportunity was to compete at the top end of the market, because that's where I think I could make some meaningful revenue. I decided to change my business plan a lot.”
That change in strategy paid off quickly.
Ways and Means Wins the Test | Sarah Andrew photo
“I have been very fortunate and I've bred quite a few winners,” said Clay. “My first was Lewis Bay, who was third in the (GI) Kentucky Oaks and was a multiple Grade II winner. But since then, I bred Vekoma, who's turned out to be a very successful stallion, and then most recently was Elite Power. I never thought when I got into the business that I would breed a champion, let alone a two-time champion.”
His purchase of Strong Incentive last year was an example of his executing his business plan to perfection. He works closely with his bloodstock advisor Reynolds Bell on how to breed successful racehorses by “an extensive examination of their dams' pedigrees,” and he said he prefers to buy mares who are stakes winners or graded stakes winners.
Strong Incentive was a black-type winner herself with an extremely live page.
“I'm always looking to upgrade my broodmare band,” he said. “Naturally, I look at the breeding stock sales to see what's there. I try to find broodmares that are highly proven on the racetrack, and I had seen that Strong Incentive had already produced a couple of graded stakes winners. And I knew that Ways and Means was Grade I-placed. And that just appealed to me. It was a strong pedigree. I look for mares that really have depth of pedigree.”
He checked with his trainer, Chad Brown, who also trains Ways and Means, and asked him if he thought the filly had the potential to win a Grade I stakes. Brown's answer: “All day long.”
“So that really gave me a lot of confidence to buy a mare where I knew the pedigree could probably be upgraded very shortly,” he said. “And I was hoping that I could get her for a price and she would definitely appreciate and her residual value would be much higher. So I paid $2.15 million for her. I knew she was going to be a very expensive mare, and I kind of thought she'd be a little bit under that. But as you know, when you've got a couple of other big breeders competing for her, you have to dig a little bit deeper. I thought a lot of other potential buyers would probably reach their max at $2 million, and I had to take that one last bid at $2.15 million.”
He was quickly proven right.
“The race Surge Capacity ran in the Matriarch was just breathtaking,” said Browning. “She defeated the very best of the best and showed the guts and determination in all of her races that you hope a horse has.”
Surge Capacity will also be offered at Night of the Stars; like Strong Incentive, she is in foal to Into Mischief.
Clay maintains a broodmare band of 20 to 25 mares, which he keeps at Lane's End and Mill Ridge Farm. “I think they're two of the best farms in Kentucky, and I've been with them since I started and have been very happy,” he said. “They're great people to work with and they really take care of the horse, which is important.”
Strong Incentive will sell with Mill Ridge, and their general manager Price Bell commended Clay for putting her in the sale. “Mr. Clay is a fantastic commercial breeder and really a part of our family,” he said. “To have the opportunity to bring her to market after what could be a very exciting Breeders' Cup weekend and to share in the buzz of this time of year…I mean, this time of year is all about dreams, right? It's the conclusion of this racing season. It's the new hope of the next breeding and foaling season. And to have a mare like this at this kind of transition point is the stuff we all work for.”
“Hats off to John and his team to identify that and take a chance,” Bell continued. “At the time he bought her, she'd been a multiple-Grade-III producer. But it's a big step to go from that to the rarified air of being a multiple-Grade-I producer. Where she is now you have horses like Urban Sea, Leslie's Lady, Toussaud. These are horses of generations and producers of generations. There are books written about blue hen mares like her. She's carrying a full to Highly Motivated, and she's done all this and she's just 12. It's an incredibly exciting opportunity for her future.”
Clay said he chose the mating to Into Mischief, who is Highly Motivated's sire and Ways and Means's sire Practical Joke's sire, due to the proven success of the nick. “Into Mischief is also a very commercial stallion,” he said. “And since I'm in the breeding business to sell, I thought there would be a good opportunity to sell the foal.”
Added Browning, “Clearly the cross has worked. It doesn't take a Tesio to to figure out that a mare carrying a full-sibling to Highly Motivated and a three-part sibling to Ways and Means is going to be sought-after.”
Not that it will be easy for Clay to part with her. “I'm in the commercial breeding business,” he said. “And I said, `I think she's worth too much to continue to have in our broodmare band.' So I decided to put her in the sale. I wasn't planning on selling Strong Incentive, but since I've owned her, she has become a multiple grade one producer. And I also know that I have her (2024) filly by Good Magic, and so even if I wasn't going to keep Strong Incentive, I have the filly by Good Magic that would carry on the family for me and my breeding program.”
With the early success that he has had, Clay is starting to be recognized for his breeding program, something of which he is justifiably gratified.
“I'm very proud to breed top-class racehorses,” he said. “I've had a lot of very respected buyers buy my horses, and I think I've built a reputation over the years for breeding a very good racehorse that can be successful on the racetrack. I think now that when people see a horse of mine that is going through the ring, they know it comes from a very credible breeder. And that's important to me.”
Clay said he is hopeful that some of the buyers he outbid last year will be back for another crack at her this fall. Browning said he was confident that she'll attract significant interest.
“It's very rare to have a mare that produces three horses of that quality being offered at public auction,” he said. “It's very rare to have a mare that has produced three horses of that quality, period. And to think that she's still young, she's in foal to arguably the best stallion in the United States, it's the real deal.”
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