Fast start

The beginning of this year’s French racing season was notable for the success of Goken with his first two-year-old runners... and the sire is still maintaining the pace at the top of the table

GUY PARIENTE has achieved a great deal as a breeder and Making a stallion is owner since creating his Haras de Colleville on a cattle farm a difficult business, close to Deauville in 2007. His yellow and white colours even for those who have become familiar in France and further afield, he is currently leading breeder in have unlimited France in 2020 and among the top ten owners. resources.

All but a The Haras de Colleville is also a very successful commercial farm and has sold handful of stallions high-class horses such as Morando, Skalleti and Kenway as well as several high-priced are failures and yearlings, including a Kendargent filly to Juddmonte for 525,000gns at Tattersalls, and few things are more one of the top lots in the Arqana August Sale last year when the farm’s Kingman colt made difficult to predict €675,000 bought by Amanda Skiffington. However, what marks Pariente out from than stallion success many others who have established breeding operations is that he has also made stallions.

Making a stallion is a difficult business, even for those who have unlimited resources. who began his career standing at €500 at a All but a handful of stallions are failures and new farm, with only a handful of breeders few things are more difficult to predict than prepared to pay for Kendargent’s services stallion success. during the early years.

Who would have imagined that, of If Kendargent’s success appears almost the group who retired to stud in 2008 uncanny it looks as though some ten years Kendargent would, ten years later, be later Pariente has repeated the trick with standing at a higher fee and have a higher Kendargent’s son Goken. profile than say Manduro or Lawman? Goken had more going for him than his sire

They were top racehorses with fashionable when he retired to the Haras de la Huderie to pedigrees who started their stud careers stand at €5,000 in 2017, and yet his success standing at significant fees at prestigious to date must have exceeded all reasonable farms, and yet they have been out-performed expectations. by a non-stakes-winning son of Kendor At the time of writing, at the end July, \

Haras de Colleville

Goken is the leading first-season sire in Europe by prize-money won, joint-leader by the number of stakes performers, and his ten individual winners put him in second place behind the leader Mehmas, who has had 49 runners compared with Goken’s 19.

New Bay is the leading first-season sire by winners to runners with 64 per cent, but Goken is a clear second with 53 per cent of his runners winning.

Even compared to all two-year-old sires Goken is highly placed behind only Kodiac (from 66 runners) and Dandy Man by prizemoney won, Kodiac and Mehmas by number of winners and Night Of Thunder, New Bay and Kingman by percentage winners to runners from ten or more runners.

Goken is already a remarkable success, while Colleville’s third stallion Galiway, a Listed-winning son of Galileo purchased from the Wertheimer brothers, has also made a more than promising start to his career. He is currently among the top ten European second-crop sires by stakes horses with four from only 75 foals in his first two crops, including the Group winner Kenway and the stakes winner Wanaway.

Goken is leading first-season sire in Europe by prize-money won, joint-leader by the number of stakes performers

The 17-year-old Kendargent is now a veteran, but in Goken and Galiway the farm has two sires who going to be popular for years to come and are ready to takeover his position as the stud’s standard-bearer.

Guillaume Vitse, the long-time manager of the Haras de Colleville, who now runs his own Noramndie Breeding, has always been an admirer of Goken’s.

“In 2017,” he remembers, “I owned only two mares and they both went to Goken.”

Vitse’s two mares Key Success and Byburg were owned in partnership with the trainers Yan Barberot and Philippe Decouz and the two resulting Goken colts Axdavali and Go Athletico went into training with the partners without going through a sale.

“The two colts grew up together and were both healthy strong horses throughout their time on the farm. The plan was always to race them,” adds Vitse.

“It was a plan which worked out well as Axdavali was second on his debut at Chantilly before breaking his maiden in Deauville by 7l at the end of May carrying the colours of Alain Jathiere.

“The colt was then a close second, beaten by the Goken filly Livachop, in the Group 3 Prix du Bois at ParisLongchamp before disappointing when making the running in the Prix Robert Papin.

“We saw in the Robert Papin that Axdavali can’t go off in front as he did far too much, next time we shall make sure he gets a lead and comes with a run at the end of his race,” adds Vitse.

Go Athletico was also second on his debut in Lyon before winning at the same track over 6f at the end of June.

Go Athletico was also second on his debut in Lyon before winning at the same track over 6f at the end of June.colours since his debut, was an excellent second in the 7f Listed Prix Roland de Chambure at ParisLongchamp.

“He has a lot of quality,” his breeder says, “and we are looking at a Group race for him at the beginning of September.”

Vitse has always been an admirer of Goken’s.

“I helped him come into the world!” he remembers. “He has always been a goodlooking horse with short canons, a good hind leg and what’s more a kind horse.

“It took everybody a bit of time to realise quite how good he was and he may have done a little too much too soon, but he came back to win stakes races at three. In the Group 1 King’s Stand Stakes he weaved all over the track trying to find a clear run and was only beaten just over length into third.”

GOKEN comes from the fourth crop of Kendargent and is the first foal of the Indian Rocket mare Goseley Chop, who raced in Pariente’s colours winning as a two-year-old and ending her career running in claimers on the Flat and finally over fences.

Goseley Chop’s destiny has been an unusual one as, after falling in a claimer over fences when in for only €12,000, she has produced a Group-winning leading young stallion in Goken, her three-year-old by Frankel, Hurricane Cloud, won on his debut this year and was then second in the Group 3 Prix de Guiche.

Her two-year-old Kingman colt All The King’s Men is in training with Fabrice Chappet having been bought by Fiona Carmichael for €675,000.

Goseley Chop has a yearling Kendargent filly called Kencarla.

Goken made his career debut in March for Pariente and trainer Henri Alex Pantall finishing second over four and a half furlongs before winning twice at Chantilly by 8l and then 6l.

He won the Prix du Bois comfortably after making all the running. He then ran with credit in all of the top French two-year-old races finishing fourth in the Prix Robert Papin (G2) and the Prix Morny (G1), third in the Criterium de Maisons-Laffitte and was beaten less than 3l when taking on his elders in the Prix de l’Abbaye de Longchamp (G1).

At three, he won the Group 3 Prix Texantia over five and a half furlongs and then, after running at both Royal Ascot and Goodwood, he was switched to trainer Kevin Ryan in Britain.

On his first start for the Ryan stable Goken won a Listed over 6f at Lingfield.

Great efforts were made to teach Goken to settle and come with a late run, but more than once he refused and ruined his chances by pulling for his head.

In the King’s Stand Stakes (G1) under Jamie Spencer he settled beautifully to run the race of his life coming from last place, once he found a clear run, to be beaten just over a length.

He retired to stud with five wins and five places from 22 starts, which included two Group wins, a Listed win and a Group 1 place.

When you look closely at Goken’s profile he was clearly a gifted racehorse who deserved his chance as a stallion particularly given the success of his sire Kendargent.

However, there were many others who retired to stud in 2017 who appeared to have a much better chance of being at the head of the European first-season sire’s table at the end of July 2020.

Goken and his sire Kendargent are the ones to continue the Kendor line

Goken, like Galiway and Kendargent before him, has turned quickly into an overachiever.

Their success is a testament to their owner’s belief and determination, and also to the opportunities provided by the French system and the prize-money and premiums on offer.

Pariente has supported his stallions – he has not put their progeny through sales rings but into training.

He currently has 45 horses in training in France, most of whom are by his own sires. By the end of July he had already earned €650,000 in prize-money and premiums, while in 2019 he won around a €1 million on the track in France.

Kendargent and Goken are both out-crosses and are able to cover the vast majority of the mares available in France and Europe.

Galiway carries the dominant strains of Galileo and Danehill, and he appears to work well with Kendargent mares, in both cases significant factors in their success.

Kendargent is also by Kendor out of a Linamix mare and inbred to Kalamoun, three important influences even if they are obscure outside France.

Kendor and Linamix were top stallions in France at a time when French breeding was depressed and played only a small part in the wider European scene, but both produced horses who had electric speed, as well as the difficult temperament which often goes with it.

Kendargent’s statistics are not as outstanding as they were when he covered only a handful of his owner’s mares, but he continues to produce gifted horses year in and year out; two of the better French-trained two-year-olds of 2020 are See The Rose and Xaario, a Kendargent filly and colt in training with André Fabre and Pia Brandt.

It seems that the Kendor sire line is going to continue to be important in France at least, and there will be others by Kendargent and his sons who will inherit the speed and the talent both Kendor and Linamix possessed.

Kendor’s best two sons, the Group 1 winners Keltos and Charge d’Affaires, both proved to be sub-fertile and so it was left to Kendargent to carry on the line which, of course, would never have been possible without Guy Pariente and his belief in his own horses.