Early foals with lofty goals
With the first foals of the Australasian-breeding season hitting the ground, we take a look at the performance of early foals in Australia’s best races over the past decade.
When Amelia’s Jewel (Siyouni) won the 2022 Northerly Stakes (Gr 1, 1800m), she was the earliest Australian-born foal to graduate to Group 1 success of the racing season.
In fact, in the past ten years of Australian racing, of subsequent Group 1 winners only 2018 Tattersall’s Tiara (Gr 1, 1400m) winner Prompt Response (Beneteau) and 2021 Coolmore Classic (Gr 1, 1500m) victrix Krone (Eurozone) have been foaled earlier in the ‘spring’ than Amelia’s Jewel was.
Conceived in France on an early southern hemisphere cover by Siyouni (Pivotal), Amelia’s Jewel arrived at Segenhoe Stud for her breeders Amelia Park on August 5, 2019. Almost four years later to the day, half a world away at Haras Du Buff in France, her dam, Bumbasina (Canford Cliffs) delivered a brother to the star mare.
His first photos hit social media this week, an early highlight of the avalanche of foal pics from breeders across Australia and New Zealand this spring. Other early arrivals include the first foals by Coolmore’s Home Affairs (I Am Invincible) and Acrobat (Fastnet Rock) and Newgate’s Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m) winner Stay Inside (Extreme Choice).
A sample of 1421 foals from the 2022 Australian breeding season, taken from the ten of the most prolific stallions in terms of foal-crop size, showed that 24.4 per cent were born in August, while just 0.7 per cent (ten) arrived before the horses’ official birthday on August 1.
September was the busiest month of 2022 for the arrival of foals, with 33.2 per cent of the crop arriving in the first official month of spring, while 29.1 per cent were foaled in October and 12.5 per cent in November. Just six foals from the sample taken arrived in December.
The peak of the season was in the third week of September with 25 foals arriving on the 22nd and 24 on the 23rd.
Foaling months of progeny of Top 10 Australia sires (by foal crop) in 2022
| Month | Foal percentage |
| July | 0.7% |
| August | 24.3% |
| September | 33.1% |
| October | 29.1% |
| November | 12.5% |
| December | 0.4% |
While those stats will vary slightly from season to season and across the entire foal crop, it is reasonable to assume that around 25 per cent of foals would be classed as early-season arrivals, foaled in either July or August.
So what does history tell us about the racetrack performance of these early foals?
Looking back at the Group 1 winners from the just completed 2022-23 season, we can see that the August foals, proportionally, underperformed. Of the 52 individual Group 1 winners in Australia bred to Southern Hemisphere time, only seven of them, or 13.5 per cent, were August foals.
Foaling months of SH-bred Group 1 winners in Australia 2022-23
| Month | G1 winners | % (SH-bred) |
| August | 7 | 13.5% |
| September | 22 | 42.3% |
| October | 17 | 32.7% |
| November | 6 | 11.5% |
Amelia’s Jewel is joined on the August list by fellow elite winners Snapdancer (Choisir), Imperatriz (I Am Invincible), Shinzo (Snitzel), Royal Merchant (Merchant Navy), Palaisipan (So You Think) and She’s Extreme (Extreme Choice).
You’ll note that six of those seven are mares or fillies, with Shinzo the only exception. Also interestingly, Shinzo is the fifth August foal in the past seven years to win Australia’s top two-year-old race, the Golden Slipper.
The highest proportion of Group 1 winners last season were September foals, which had 22 representatives, making up 42.3 per cent of the total. That list includes the winners of the other four two-year-old Group 1s, Militarize (Dundeel) (two wins), King Colorado (Kingman) and Little Brose (Per Incanto).
There were 17 individual Group 1 winners foaled in October, 32.7 per cent of the total, slightly above the estimated overall representation (30 per cent) of total foals born in that month. That October list includes Australia’s two top sprinters of the season, Giga Kick (Scissor Kick) and I Wish I Win (Savabeel).
The November foal Group-1 alumni is smaller in number, with six individual horses, but does include the horse who will almost certainly claim honours as Australian Racehorse Of The Year, Anamoe (Street Boss).
Anamoe, a November 16 foal, was the latest born foal to win an Australian Group 1 race last season. Interestingly, the previous season there were five other Group 1 winners with foal dates later than Anamoe’s.
The other change when we look at the 2021-22 results is that August foals were the most successful in that campaign. There were 17 individual Group 1 winners, or 32 per cent of those foaled to southern hemisphere-time, in this category.
In that season, there were 14 Australian Group 1 winners who were September foals (26.4 per cent), just nine in October (17 per cent), while there were 13 in November (24.5 per cent).
Foaling months of SH-bred Group 1 winners in Australia 2021-22
| Month | G1 winners | % (SH-bred) |
| August | 17 | 32.1% |
| September | 14 | 26.4% |
| October | 9 | 17.0% |
| November | 13 | 24.5% |
It was this significant season-to-season variation that sent your columnist on a perhaps foolish, and certainly time-consuming task of tracing the foaling dates for every Australian Group 1 winner in the past decade, tracing back to the start of 2012-13 season.
That list takes in 509 horses, 435 of which were foaled to southern hemisphere time, and gives a more consistent sense of which month’s foals have performed best on the big stage.
There is only one July foal in that collection, the already mentioned Prompt Response.
The list contains 86 August foals, or 19.8 per cent of the total. You’ll recall we said that 25 per cent of foals arrive before September 1, yet over the decade-long time period, they represent just over 20 per cent of top-flight winners. In that statistic at least, they are underperforming. Mind you, the list does include August 18 foal Black Caviar (Bel Esprit), unbeaten in 25 races and 16 Group 1s.
There are 162 Group 1-winning representatives of the September foal set, or 37.2 per cent of the total. That is higher than the overall September representation of total foals, which in that extensive sample in 2022 stood at 33.2 per cent. The most famous of the foals born in that month is supermare Winx (Street Cry), who was foaled on September 14.
October foals are the second most successful when it comes to Group 1-winning representatives with 119, or 27.4 per cent of the total. That is pretty close to their estimated population representation of 29 per cent.
The Group 1-winning list contains 66 November foals, or 15.2 per cent, an overperformance on their estimated representation of 12.5 per cent. This list features Nature Strip (Nicconi), second only behind Winx when it comes to prize-money earned, and who shares the same foaling date as Anamoe, albeit four years apart.
There is just one Australian Group 1 winner in the past decade who was foaled in December. That was 2012 Winterbottom Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) victor Barakey (Key Business).
So, what is historically the most successful foaling date in Australia? Over the past decade, 10 individual Group 1 winners have been foaled on September 7. Days in September also feature on the second line of the statistics, with the 5th, 26th and 28th all responsible for nine Group 1 winners over that time period.
Foaling months of SH-bred Group 1 winners in Australia since 2012-13
| Month foaled | G1 winners | Percentage of G1 winners (SH-bred) |
| July | 1 | 0.23% |
| August | 86 | 19.77% |
| September | 162 | 37.24% |
| October | 119 | 27.36% |
| November | 66 | 15.17% |
| December | 1 | 0.23% |