Gun Runner to Cover Mares on Southern Hemisphere Time

Three Chimneys is exploring the Southern Hemisphere market with its top sire, Gun Runner  , without physically shuttling this year's leading second-crop sire overseas.

As first reported by TDN AusNZ, the farm announced this week it is breeding a limited number of mares on Southern Hemisphere time to the 9-year-old son of Candy Ride   and has already booked several contracts at US$75,000 per season.

"With his fast start at stud, there have been a lot of inquiries," Doug Cauthen told BloodHorse July 19. He owns Doug Cauthen Thoroughbred Management and is a Three Chimneys board member and adviser. "The stallion is not going to shuttle, so this is a way to introduce him to those markets and see how his progeny perform in the auction arena, but more importantly on the racetrack."

Most of the mare owners have ties to the Australian market, according to Cauthen, with a few others coming from South American countries.

The size of Gun Runner's Southern Hemisphere book will be determined strictly by the quality of the mares submitted.

"We are limiting the book because we are focused on the quality," Cauthen said. "He has to have a real shot to start positively."

Gun Runner, a six-time grade 1 winner and Horse of the Year and champion older male of 2017, was last year's leading freshman sire by a wide margin, with $4,315,980 in progeny earnings to second-ranked Practical Joke  's $2,184,295. He also led his sire class in 2021 in winners (31), graded stakes winners (four), and grade 1 winners (two).

The stallion has already built a commanding lead on this year's second-crop sires list with more than $6.36 million in progeny earnings and nine black-type stakes winners as of July 19. He also secured his first American classic winner when his son Early Voting  captured the Preakness Stakes (G1). His other elite runners include Arkansas Derby (G1) winner Cyberknife ; Runhappy Santa Anita Derby (G1) winner Taiba ; 2021 champion 2-year-old filly Echo Zulu , who won the NetJets Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies (G1) last year along with two other grade 1 stakes and won this year's Twinspires.com Fair Grounds Oaks (G2); and, Gunite , who won last year's Hopeful Stakes (G1).

Gonçalo Borges Torrealba, the owner of Three Chimneys, has shuttled several stallions to South America, finding successful markets in particular for the late Exchange Rate , who sired 7% Southern Hemisphere stakes winners, including multiple Argentine champion Kalithea . Will Take Charge  , the Eclipse champion 3-year-old colt of 2013, is off to a solid start as well, having sired two stakes winners and a champion in Peru from five to race in South America.

Cauthen said shuttling Gun Runner to Australia, in particular, had been contemplated but that the market didn't seem ripe for him.

"He has started so well that this seems like a good balance of not physically shuttling him and still testing the market," he said.