At the age of 82, New South Wales breeder Bob Hannon has decided it’s time to take a step back.
With Cox Plate winner Shamus Award, top two-year-old and emerging Negate sire Cosmic Force as well as the brilliantly fast but cursed filly Amelia’s Dream among his breeding credits, Hannon has made the call to sell his Ascot Park property on the outskirts of Sydney where many of the high-class horses were raised.
And his reasoning for doing so is a reasonably simple and understandable one.
“My manager was leaving, I’m scaling down and it’s the aging process, mate,” suggested Hannon.
Although the inevitable complexities of getting older has led to Hannon putting Ascot Park on the market, it doesn’t mean the boutique breeder, who has been able to hold his own against the giants of the industry with his small band of 15 or so broodmares, is giving the game away completely.
He has outsourced the day-to-day management of his horses, with the mares and their offspring now residing at nearby Fairview Park as well as at Yarraman Park in horse breeding heartland of Scone in the Hunter Valley rather than on his own 15-hectare farm at Pitt Town near Hawkesbury.
The Group 2 winner Olentia as well as the Zoustar mare’s half-brother, the Listed winner Malkovich, Group 3 winner Wandabaa and Magic Millions 2YO Classic winner Shaquero also bear the Hannon brand.
An I Am Invincible half-sister to Shaquero will be offered at next month’s Magic Millions sale on the Gold Coast by Yarraman Park on behalf of Hannon whose exploits as a breeder will also be on display at Friday night’s inaugural night race meeting on the Gold Coast.
The Hannon-bred Torque To Be Sure - a true Ascot Park family being by Shamus Award out of his homebred Fastnet Rock mare Elimbari - will line up in the $250,000 The Debut.
He was a $260,000 buy for agent Neil Jenkinson and trainer Matthew Dunn who selected him out of the draft of Brian Nutt’s Attunga Stud, which prepared the colt for Hannon on that occasion.
“When you breed 15 mares a year, you’re lucky you end up with 10 or 11 foals, I'd say, that’s about it, but they've been good to me,” Hannon says of breeding horses.
“I love it, it’s a bit of a passion, it’s kept me occupied and off the streets.”
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Ascot Park has a 12-horse stable complex and a four-bedroom homestead and Hannon has owned the property for 22 years.
Prior to that, he had a mixed farm near Denman for about 30 years, but he sold it to buy the farm on the Hawkesbury River at Pitt Town after becoming fed up with the amount of travelling he was doing to and from the Hunter Valley.
As for interest in his latest land sell-off, there have been a few bites from potential buyers, he says, but nothing concrete at this stage.
“If you wanted to build on there, you wouldn't get anywhere better in the world. The mountains, the sunsets, whenever you get down there, it's unbelievable,” Hannon says of the views provided from Ascot Park, which could also be suitable for other mixed agricultural uses such as turf farming.
Hannon has nurtured many of the families he’s breeding to now for generations and foresight is again at play, with the octogenarian electing to retain the I Am Invincible half-sister to Olentia and Malkovich, the last foal out of Mabkhara, to race with his sons David, Michael, James and Chris.
This year, Hannon’s breeding operation has supported stallions such as Home Affairs, Shinzo, Ozzmosis and, of course, Cosmic Force, the Pago Pago and Roman Consul Stakes winner who stands at Newgate Farm.
He has four first crop stakes horses and already this season two-year-old Becash has been placed in the Group 3 Maribyrnong Plate at Flemington.
“He just needs one good one and he's got some knocking on the door,” Hannon said of Cosmic Force.
“They get out and run, they're good sorts, the trainers like them. He'll be a good sire, I think.”
Little Zeta, the dam of Cosmic Force, Group 3 winner Onemorezeta and Listed winner Razeta, has an August-born colt by Home Affairs at foot.
