Tatsu Still Basking In Grade 1 Glory At Six

When people talk about iron horses, they will generally regale you with stories of long distance runners who have sustained a high level of performance way beyond the normal length of the average horse’s racing career.

Very seldom do people throw sprinters into the iron horse category.

But there is a six year old horse in the sim, and he is a sprinter, and given the tremendous way he’s still performing at six years old, it’s may be appropriate to toss a turf sprinter by the name of Tatsu, who races for Given Stables, into the iron horse category.

The six year old son of Ghostzapper has won 13 stakes races in his 40 career starts, and he’s racked up a whopping $5,256,145 for his owner Dan, who owns Given Stables and who in real life is the Director of Communications and Media Relations for Belmont, Saratoga and Aqueduct race courses in New York.

Tatsu is out of a Storm Cat mare by the name of Mother Of Dragons, who has definitely lived up to her name by showing a propensity for throwing stakes winners in the shed. Of her six foals, four are graded stakes winners and two are listed stakes winners. Her six foals have earned nearly $8 million on the track for Given Stables.

As Mother Of Dragons’ owner will tell you, Tatsu has been the biggest dragon of all six of Mother Of Dragons’ foals. “Tatsu is undoubtedly the best of the bunch, which is saying a lot. I don’t even remember why I went with Ghostzapper (when I bred Tatsu) . He was a hot young sire and seemed to be getting some good Sim runners, so I gave him a chance. And yes, it’s funny that while Mother of Dragons was a dirt runner, three of her offspring are better on the turf.”

“By the way, I should mention that Mother of Dragons is named for Daenerys Targaryen from the Game of Thrones books and TV series, in case anyone has been watching it on HBO,” said Dan.

Of Tatsu’s 13 stakes wins, Tatsu has an incredible 10 graded stakes wins. He has definitely shown his best efforts on the turf, even though he started off his career on the dirt as a two year old. “Tatsu was pretty good on the dirt, winning a few races and running second in a stakes at a mile. But he really showed his talent when I switched him to the turf.”

Dan says he tries to make sure he gives his horses opportunities on both surfaces early in their careers, no matter how well they’ve been doing on the other surface they‘ve previously run on.

“Unless a horse is undefeated, they can always be better on the other surface, right?” asked Dan. “Take a look at my three year old filly Empire of Fire, who is actually a granddaughter of Mother of Dragons. She won a graded stakes on the dirt and ran in the Kentucky Oaks, and I finally tried her on turf a few weeks ago and she blew up. Maybe she could have won the 1000 Guineas if I had tried (her on) turf earlier. I think it’s very important to try both surfaces early on.”

So, when Tatsu’s first turf race produced a higher speed figure than any of his dirt races, Dan knew in his heart that Tatsu belonged on the lawn.

It didn’t take Tatsu long to establish himself as a future champion on the turf, once he got there as a three year old. By the time he hit his third and fourth starts on the turf, he was popping triple digit speed figures while winning his first two listed stakes events in Deauville and Berkshire in early 2008.

It took a few tries in graded events before Tatsu would get his first graded stakes win, and that came in the 7.5 furlong Grade 3 George Rides Stakes in Queensland, where Tatsu threw the highest speed figure of his career, a 119 whopper.

After Tatsu won the $250,000 Grade 2 Len Knocks Stakes in July of 2009 in Newmarket, it wouldn’t be until the very last race of his four year old career before he would get the first of his seven grade 1 wins. And that came in December of 2009 in Hong Kong, when he won the $1.5 million King Kong Stakes in Hong Kong, where he won in wire-to-wire fashion while throwing a 114 speed figure.

“It’s so hard to win grade 1 races in this game that I treasure all of them,” said Dan. “But two really stick out (for Tatsu). The first was the 2010 Equinics. In 2006 my residency, the GR Simsters, won the Equinics. And it was a great thrill, but none of my horses ran all that well. In 2008 we got nipped out in the Equinics, and again my horses ran poorly, which was a real disappointment. I pride myself on really being able to get my horses to run well in specific spots, and not winning any Equinics races either year was not what I had in mind.”

So when Tatsu popped a 117 speed figure in winning the 2010 Grade 1 Shining Sea Sprint Stakes, leading from gate to wire, Dan was more than thrilled. When you hear Dan speak of it, it probably felt like a burden had been lifted off his shoulders, and three years of Equinics drought for his residency was finally brought to an end.

“I was really feeling the pressure going into the 2010 Equinics. Some people thought we were on the downward descent as a residency, and I knew that if we were going to win, my horses would have to perform. Tatsu lined up against 19 other horses, went right to the front, and was never challenged, winning easily with a 117 speed figure,” said Dan. “I also won two other Equinics that day, and the GR Simsters proved victorious (in 2010), and that was for me the best day I’ve ever had in the Sim. It was a real sense of achievement, and Tatsu led the way.”

That day would start an incredible run for Tatsu, arguably the greatest stretch of his career. In his next four starts after the Equinics 2010 win, he would win three more grade 1’s, including the $1 million Sand Castle Turf Sprint in Dubai, the $800,000 Strand Broke in Victoria, and the $250,000 Cup Of July Stakes in Newmarket. And the way he’s running in 2011, this stretch of races leading up to the Cup Of July Stakes could be just as good, if not greater, than last year’s streak.

But Dan said after the 2010 Equinics win, the second biggest win of Tatsu’s career would come in Dubai this year.

“The other victory that really sticks out happened this year. It looked like he might be done, after he lost three in a row in late fall (in 2010) in very dull fashion,” said Dan, who thought about retiring Tatsu at that point.

“But I wanted to see if he had any juice left, so I gave him 10 weeks off and brought him back in an allowance to prep for a defense of the Dubai Sand Castle Turf Sprint, which he won in 2010. His comeback race for the 2011 Sand Castle was also dull, but I still had faith in him and went to Dubai anyway, and he won easily. That was pretty awesome, winning that race two years in a row. He’s a pretty special horse.”

Indeed he was, at that point, and he still is. And it’s a good thing that Dan didn’t retire Tatsu before that second big win in Dubai in 2011, because the horse that just keeps going and going and going is still going strong, winning the Grade 2 French Toast in Deauville on April 30 and defending his title in the Grade 1 Strand Broke earlier this month. And he’s thrown speed figures of 112, 115 and 114 in that stretch of three graded wins this year.

So what’s the big secret for Tatsu? How does this seemingly iron horse of the turf sprint world keep coming back, year after year, performing as well as or, in some cases, even better than the year before, after Dan thought of retiring him before his last three graded wins this year?

Even Dan, who started training in 2004, has to admit he can‘t take all the credit for that.

“It obviously has a lot to do with his (genetic) coding in the game, in that some horses don’t have longevity. But he does, and I can’t take credit for that. However, what I can take credit for is something I think is vitally important to keeping top horses in good form, and that is giving them at least two months off a few times a year. That really seems to refresh the batteries. My two-time Breeder’s Bowl winner, Casterly Rock, seemed done a few times, and I gave him ten weeks off, and it was like recharging the batteries. It seems like it’s the same with Tatsu.”

Another thing that Tatsu has done in his last three grade 1 wins this season is win all of them from gate to wire, which isn’t so unusual in that he’s done that before. But generally, as horses like Tatsu get older, they seem to regress to a more rated style of running, often coming from behind and developing a knack for knowing where the wire is late and getting up to win.

Not so with Tatsu. “Yeah, I mean it’s pretty incredible. I know that some people say they don’t like frontrunners, because they don’t think they hold on that often. Tell that to Tatsu,” laughed Dan.

As Tatsu gets ready to defend his Cup of July Stakes title win in Newmarket in a few weeks, according to Dan, about the only thing that seems missing on the resume of this son of Ghostzapper is a Breeders’ Bowl win. He’s tried twice, finishing seventh in both of his Breeder’s Bowl sprint tries the last two seasons.

“I guess he doesn’t like racing in the fall!” exclaimed Dan. The months between July and December seem to have been the only times that Tatsu has been particularly vulnerable in his career.

“As a three year old he was 4-(0-1-0) from August through November, and as a four year old he was 3-(1-0-0) those same months, with his only win coming in an allowance. Then, as a five year old, he was 3-(1-0-0) those months with the lone win again being an allowance. I don’t know. Maybe he’s just not (genetically) coded to run well in the fall.”

It’s not that the Breeders’ Bowl in particular has been a bugaboo for Dan as a trainer and owner. Au contraire. He’s definitely had his fair share of success in the fall classic. Casterly Rock has two dirt sprint Breeders’ Bowl wins in 2005 and 2006 and is a Hall Of Fame inductee. And Beggar King won the 2010 Breeders’ Bowl Dirt Mile, defending that title for Dan’s other Breeders’ Bowl Dirt Mile win in 2009 with Watergate Scandal. Dan came close to a fifth Breeders’ Bowl win in 2009 when his A.P. Indy mare The Word finished second in the Breeders’ Bowl Distaff.

But Tatsu has yet to capture a Breeders’ Bowl win. After Tatsu attempts to defend his Cup Of July Stakes title in a couple weeks, Dan has a few decisions to make. “It’s 17 weeks to the Breeders’ Bowl, and I will have to figure out what to do. I may give him 13 weeks off and prep him once for the race, or I could give him nine weeks off and prep him twice. I’ll do one of those two things.”

Of the 2,000 or so horses Dan estimates he has bred, he has fifteen active racers who have won a million dollars or more in their careers, and a handful of others are on the verge of accomplishing that feat. And God knows how many who are retired have done the same.

But Tatsu remains his biggest earner of all.

If Tatsu should somehow break out of his fall funk and happen to get that coveted Breeders’ Bowl win in 2011 that would undoubtedly be the icing on the cake of a stellar career, does retirement loom on the horizon for the six year old son of Ghostzapper?

Maybe not, according to Dan.

“The one thing in his favor in terms of me keeping on running him is that Ghostzapper has been downgraded a lot as a sire, so I don’t feel the need to breed to Tatsu. He may have another year to strut his stuff. I’d love to get him into the SIM Hall Of Fame. And with seven grade 1 wins at the moment, I feel like he could retire tomorrow and have a strong case. But the more wins, the better shot he has of getting in. Either way, he’s a pretty special horse.”

A very special horse indeed. And maybe one day you’ll hear people talk about him as an iron horse, when it’s all said and done.