Only seven sires with more than 50 winners have a higher strike rate than 50 per cent when it comes to winners to runners in Australia, with one-time Japanese shuttle stallion Real Impact leading the way.
Real Impact already owns a piece of Australian racing history as one of only 10 Japanese-bred horses to win a Group 1 race in Australia.
His victory in the 2015 George Ryder Stakes, at the time just the fourth win by a Japanese horse in an elite Australian race, precipitated another chance at a unique legacy as he became the first of those Group 1 winners to stand at stud in Australia.
The son of Deep Impact spent three seasons shuttling to Arrowfield, who pioneered the crossing of Japanese and Australian bloodlines over the past 24 years. Like a lot of trailblazers, the commercial market didn’t quite know how to assess where he sat across those three seasons from 2016 to 2018.
Standing at $19,250, he attracted 134 mares in his first year, 106 in his second and 70 in his third. Foal crops of 98, 73 and 47 emerged from those seasons, and as yearlings they averaged $56,173, $51,032 and $31,596 respectively.
His numbers were respectable but not spectacular in that regard. Australian yearling buyers were still adjusting to assessing Japanese-bred types. They certainly weren’t what Australians would say ‘two-year-olds’. Only six juvenile winners have subsequently emerged from Real Impact’s three Australian crops.
As a racehorse, he had strong two-year-old credentials. He was narrowly beaten in a Group 1 at the end of his juvenile campaign and is the only horse this century to win the Yasuda Kinen as a three-year-old, but he was a Northern Hemisphere seven-year-old when he won the George Ryder and was runner-up in the Doncaster.
As time has progressed, it has become clear that those who invested in Real Impact’s Australian stock are being rewarded for their time and patience. As things stand this season, there is no stallion (with more than 50 winners) with a higher winners-to-runners percentage in Australia.
For 2023/24 that currently sits at 55.1 per cent, with 54 winners from 98 runners.
It is far from a fluke season. In 2022/23, Real Impact was the second highest-ranked stallion on that metric with 55.9 per cent Australian winners-to-runners (behind Star Turn). In 2021/22, that stat for Real Impact was at 50.1 per cent.
To give that some context, he is one of only three stallions to have more than 50 Australian winners at a better than 50 per cent winners-to-runners percentage in each of the past three seasons. The others are Rich Enuff and Zoustar.
Sky Lab, the recent Listed Scone Cup winner, has been his flagbearer this season and last, while his two other stakes winners in Australia have been Lunar Impact and Count De Rupee.
Australian breeders have not had access to Real Impact since 2018, and his youngest Australian crop is about to turn five. Since then, he has remained in Japan and now stands at Yushun Stallion Station.
With so many highly credentialed sons of Deep Impact to compete with, it hasn’t been easy for Real Impact on home soil, although he has had 179 winners from 279 runners.
His best Japanese-bred horse has been G1 NHK Mile Cup winner Lauda Sion, who makes his debut at stud in Australia at Larneuk Stud in Victoria this year.
Real Impact in Australia
Source: Arion.co.nz
So which other stallions rank particularly highly when it comes to winners-to-runners in Australia this season?
Widden’s Zoustar, who looks poised to become just the second stallion to break the 200-winners-in-a-season mark, is ranked second of those with more than 50 winners and has 196 from 365, or 53.7 per cent.
Third is Newhaven Park’s Xtravagant, with 54 from 102, or 52.9 per cent, while fourth is another Japanese-bred stallion from Arrowfield, Maurice, who has 65 from 123, or 52.9 per cent.
Coolmore’s seemingly ageless Starspangledbanner is enjoying his best season when it comes to racetrack results, with four individual stakes winners. Overall, he has 53 Australian winners from 103 runners, 51.5 per cent.
Star Witness, now based at Widden Victoria, and Woodside Park’s Rich Enuff, are both on 50 per cent winners to runners in Australia this season.
Those just below that cut-off include two champion sires in Snitzel and Written Tycoon, both who could easily find themselves above that 50 per cent mark by season’s end.
Leading sires by winners-to-runners percentage in Australia (more than 50 winners) (Source: Arion.co.nz)
