October
MayHonour our greats
The great stallion Star Kingdom, imported by Stanley Wootton from the UK in about 1950, has left a sireline of remarkable longevity, unmatched in Australia’s long thoroughbred history.
At present it covers six generations — in sequence, Biscay, Bletchingly, Cossack Warrior, Brave Warrior, Show a Heart, Toorak Toff.
Previous Australasian sirelines rarely went beyond a second generation, e.g. Carbine, Heroic, Beau Pere, Foxbridge.
Star Kingdom’s grandsire Hyperion’s line, once so successful, seems to have disappeared from world breeding. So our truly Australian line is unique.
Iconoclasm, the lovely three-year-old colt by Toorak Toff, is showing great promise on the track. It is to be hoped that in time he will be given every opportunity at stud to further Star Kingdom’s legacy.
It also should be noted that Sir Tristram’s great son Zabeel’s prepotency has already reached a fourth generation and shows promise of continuing down the track — in order: Zabeel, Octagonal, Lonhro, Pierro. And some other sons of Lonhro are showing up at stud.
A line to match Star Kingdom’s longevity? Hopefully so.
In honour of surely the two greatest stallions ever imported to our part of the world, it would be fitting if our race clubs were to name two Group 1 races the Star Kingdom and the Sir Tristram.
Carnegie (Vic)