An unlikely star: "We put him behind a hedge so no one could see him.”

Cover image courtesy of NZ Racing Desk

It’s a dilemma that all studmasters will face sooner or later: One of your best mares produces a foal with a limb so deformed that is commercially unviable. In laymen’s terms, at least one of its legs sits at an odd angle, and it will not interest buyers at a yearling sale.

I Wish I Win is out of the Pins mare Make A Wish (NZ), who produced the stakes winner Another Dollar (NZ) (Ocean Park {NZ}), and is from the family of Group 1 winner Savy Yong Blonk (NZ) (Savabeel).

Therefore, the arrival of I Wish I Win as a foal with his left leg sitting at a stark angle was not what Chittick had hoped for.

“From day one we were hugely disappointed to have a foal born with that leg out of one of our favourite mares. It’s one of our favourite families, she’s a beautiful mare and typically the family leaves great types.

“At that stage, we hadn’t sold his full brother, but we knew he was a beautiful horse, and he was going to be at the top end of whatever yearling sale he was going to go to.”

That full brother, now named No Limits (NZ), sold for NZ$1.4 million at the 2019 New Zealand Bloodstock National Yearling Sale to David Ellis.

“And then we got this bloke; he was shocking. For the first couple of times you laid eyes on him you didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.”

Less is more

So, how exactly did I Wish I Win progress from there to be the current favourite for the G1 Sir Rupert Clarke S.? There are many options available to studmasters in the same situation, from confinement to reduced exercise (and therefore strain on limbs), to more involved surgical options.

Waikato Stud is firmly in the ‘less is more’ camp. Whilst many studs will turn to surgery when faced with such a serious angular limb deformity, Chittick prefers to keep things natural, and rarely have they taken that option for Waikato’s young horses.

Gallery: I Wish I Win (NZ) as a foal, images courtesy of Waikato Stud

But that doesn’t mean the horses are left to themselves - far from it, in fact. There are many management options that can be taken to assist in correction.

“Any foal born here at Waikato Stud has a constant and very experienced eye over them from the minute they're born. Whether that’s myself, Garry (Chittick), Mike Rennie, Jaimee Gowler, Andrew Jackson, and our on-farm farrier Kane Clayton-Greene – between all of those people they’re thinking the same way, as natural as possible with no pressure applied,” Chittick explained.

“All of those people have over 10 years experience, if not 20 years experience of watching, nurturing and growing foals. They’ve all had experience with horses going through our system with that philosophy, and they’ve seen the results.”

The options available

“I’ve heard many examples of people using screws to help with their development to straighten things up, but that’s not something we do,” said Chittick.

Using a screw refers to transphyseal bridging, whereby a screw is inserted across the growth plate in either the fetlock or the knee, slowing the growth on one side and therefore correcting an angular limb deformity.

“We did once, and I was even against that, but our vet, Trent Jorgensen, convinced me in this case. We had a filly with a hind fetlock that was rolling out, and he said a screw may help here. So, we put a screw in there for three months and it certainly has helped her walking ability, and it looks more comfortable for the horse.

“That’s the only time we’ve ever used a screw on a horse… but I’m not on other farms, and I’m not saying they’re wrong and we’re right.”

“I Wish I Win would have been a classic example for a screw, but we let him develop through.”

Another option available to studs is periosteal stripping, which involves agitating the periosteum over the growth plate to accelerate growth on one side. But Chittick said Waikato moved away from using this procedure some time ago.

“We’re constantly watching these foals but the last time we did a periosteal strip on the farm was probably 10 years ago. I’m not against them, because it’s such a minor operation at the early part of their life,” he said.

The contention over their effectiveness arises because the operation almost always involves a subsequent period of confinement for the foal, and there is debate over which of the two changes brings the results.

“Quite often, when we were doing periosteal strips, we were confining foals because they’d had this little operation,” Chittick said.

“But what was working? Was it the confinement or the periosteal strip? Well, we haven’t done a periosteal strip for 10 years and we’re still getting the same results.”

One of the options that requires even less intervention is in addressing the foot. By applying glue or extensions, a farrier can alter the balance of the limb and encourage a young horse’s limb to land and move straighter. This is the only applied ‘treatment’ that I Wish I Win received.

“We did apply glue to his foot, as a lot of us do, which is minimal intervention to alter the balance of the foot. But, within two or three weeks it became pretty evident that it was actually starting to mis-form the shape of his foot. So, we took that off.

“The main treatment we gave the horse was to put him in a small paddock behind a hedge so no one could see him,” Chittick laughed.

What effect do limb deformities have?

Those in the bloodstock industry spend years honing their eye in identifying prospective racehorses, and often considered a necessary skill is the ability to identify and assess angular limb deformities, and weigh up their likely effect on racing performance and soundness.

Whilst Chittick can surely be counted amongst Australasia’s greatest, with Waikato Stud being record-setting Champion Breeders, he questions the perceived wisdom.

Obviously, studs are looking to present attractive yearlings to the sales in order to bring healthy returns, but his eye for detail leads him to conclude that for all the effort of producing a ‘correct’ horse, this doesn’t necessarily reflect in racecourse performance, and can even be detrimental.

“I’m a big believer that how they’re made is how they’re made, and if you play around with things too much you risk altering a horse away from its natural gait,” he said.

“…a lot of the things that we’re doing early on in their lives are for cosmetic reasons for yearling sales.”

He sums up the matter with a salient point about the progeny of the dam, Make A Wish:

“He’s the only one she’s had like that. He’s the worst conformed and the fastest so far.”

He also believes that horse’s differing rates of maturing mean that some aren’t ready to be shown at their best when yearling sales come around, and his life of experience in the Stud has seen the philosophy change at Waikato.

“Up until 10 years or so ago we had the blinkers on as such. We had 14 months or so to make them look the best they can look,” he said.

“But I’m a believer now that every horse has its opportunity, and for a lot of them it won’t be as a 14 or 16-month-old horse who’s going to get walked up, picked and prodded and seen for two minutes in a yearling auction ring.”

This means that these days Waikato present their yearlings at sales with future development in mind.

“Come the yearling sales we try not to have our horses too heavy,” Chittick explained. “They’re only young horses… they’ve still got another good year or so of development ahead of them.”

And importantly, Chittick explained that for some horses less intervention and a more patient approach means not spoiling their chance as a racehorse.

“I do think that with those ones that are a little bit marginal, most of the time it’s just immaturity, and if they’re pushed through a yearling sale you won’t get that opportunity to find out when their best day is.”

However, such was the extreme case presented to him with I Wish I Win, a yearling sale was never going to be an option for the horse.

“I could never have tried. You could not have given that horse away!”

Some traditional inspiration

The source of limb deformities isn’t one that’s fully understood, though Chittick has a theory as to how they can be mitigated, and one that he successfully put into practice with I Wish I Win.

“Quite often, I believe, they have too much natural muscle. His limbs just weren’t up to carrying the bulk. He was out of proportion, and too heavy for his joints as a young horse,” he explained.

Hence, some inspiration from a notable breeder led to I Wish I Win being gelded to help his frame cope as he developed.

“One thing I like doing with a horse like him, who was never going to go to a yearling sale, is gelding early,” Chittick said.

“There’s two schools of thought, that you let them develop as colts to get that natural muscle and then they’re gelded. Or, and it’s a more of an old horseman’s view, you do it early.

“Bob Morris was a great breeder here in New Zealand, and he was a great believer in gelding early. He even used to geld some before the yearling sales. He believed that if they were gelded early, they developed better, with less testosterone.”

I Wish I Win was gelded at 12 months, and from there he was left alone to develop on his own.

The next steps

Since any problems with the horse at the late yearling stage were purely cosmetic, it soon came time to send him for a pre-race education.

“We left him a little bit later to start, and I sent him to Jamie and Chanel Beatson at Ohukia, and I said, ‘You can’t laugh at this horse’.”

The reports from his pre-race education were good, and there were no signs that soundness was going to interrupt his career at that stage. ‘You wouldn’t know when you’re on him’ was the report that came back from Jamie Beatson, and I Wish I Win soon found himself in a jump-out at Cambridge.

“Jamie is a fantastic horseman, and he was pretty complimentary about him,” said Chittick. “So, then it got to a stage where we had to place him with a trainer.”

The horse was placed into training with Jamie Richards and, after two successful trials, in March of his 2-year-old year he won his first start at Awapuni. And an impressive victory sparked interest from international buyers.

“I had numerous phone calls from people to purchase him for Hong Kong,” recalled Chittick. “By all means go and have a look, but I don’t think you’ll be wanting to buy him,” he told them.

“All of them rang back and said, ‘I see what you’re talking about.’”

He quickly became a farm favourite, and hence was retained whilst he continued into his 3-year-old campaign in good company – including a third in Group 3 which earned him a start in the G1 New Zealand Guineas.

Although he failed to fire that day, he finished off his Classic year with a third place in the G1 Levin Classic, behind Imperatriz (I Am Invincible) and On The Bubbles (Brazen Beau).

Having taken in nine races up to that point, he certainly couldn’t be described as an unsound horse, though that didn’t mean that connections were wary.

“We certainly used to run the x-ray through his joints and there was one time when there was a little remodelling, but we just gave him the time to catch up and it hasn’t held us up at all.

“We got to the end of his 3-year-old career with a sound horse who is Group 1 placed.”

The move to Australia

With I Wish I Win having found himself a family favourite at Waikato, a move to Australia and a chance for some big prizes beckoned.

“We’re racing him for fun because we love him, and Moods (Peter Moody) came up with an idea for him to join his stable so that’s what we did.

“He’s had one start in Australia, and it looked pretty impressive.”

Having recounted the story by which he found himself with such an unlikely yet exciting Group 1 prospect, Chittick chuckled as he said: “His next start is in the Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes, 1400 metres, September 17, for a million bucks!

“He’s giving us a hell of a lot of fun and let’s hope it continues that way.”