By the time the 2020 breeding season rolled around, the previous year’s Caulfield Guineas winner Super Seth owed Mark Chittick and his fellow shareholders NZ$18 million.
The enormous financial outlay was made before the son of Dundeel had even covered a mare in his first season at Waikato Stud, a farm renowned for standing champion sires, at an introductory service fee of $35,000 (plus GST).
Chittick and his fellow investors such as Pencarrow Stud's Sir Peter Vela and GSA Bloodstock’s Jonathan Munz, who raced the Anthony Freedman-trained colt, had a theory about how best to breed to Super Seth given his pedigree.
“It was really interesting as Super Seth is a horse that stands a good 16hh, 16.1hh, but how do we put it, we were a little bit conscious of his pedigree and his sire and making sure that we bred good-sized horses,” Chittick tells The Straight in reference to the stature of Dundeel who stands 15.3hh.
“But what became evident pretty quickly was that he didn’t want too much size on the mare side. A good medium-sized mare is ideal for him.
“Certainly, in that first crop, we did get a couple of big ones out of those bigger mares.”
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