South Africa’s Santos sets sights on success
Young gun, who made a splash at the Cape Premier Yearling Sale earlier this year, talks aspirations, Australia and audits
Christopher Santos may not have the name recognition of some of the world’s leading thoroughbred traders but the emerging South African agent hopes that, in time, he will earn his spot among the leading players on the world stage.
In what field, though, remains something of a question.
Santos, widely known as Toffa in South Africa’s tight-knit racing circles, wears many hats: bloodstock agent, jockey manager, syndicator, form student. The 28-year-old has quickly become a force in his homeland and is widely recognised as one of the rising stars on the global racing scene.
Put that to him, though, and he remains incredibly humble, realising that he is still very much in the fledgling stages of his racing career.
“I wouldn’t put myself up in the higher echelon of South African bloodstock agents or experts or trainers, but this game is very subjective and opinionated. I definitely have a couple of opinions of my own and that’s the beauty of it,” Santos told ANZ Bloodstock News yesterday.
“I’d say the form aspect is my strongest asset and the bloodstock has come on from that. I see them as linked, too; understanding pedigrees helps to understand what to expect from a horse throughout his career, they are tied in together. However, the bloodstock side has become a lot more prevalent in what I do and ultimately I hope to be able to incorporate it more prominently.”
Santos made a splash in January when buying one of the top lots at the Cape Premier Yearling Sale in Cape Town. The colt, a Gimmethegreenlight (More Than Ready) half-brother to that week’s L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate (Gr 1, 1600m) winner Vardy (Var), fetched R2.2 million (approx A$175,000) – a steal in Australian terms but big bucks in South Africa’s deflated market. Only one of the 232 catalogued lots brought more money.
It was a quick rise to prominence for a man who, a decade earlier, was yet to own his first horse.
“I’m not from a traditional racing family, never have been,” he said. “I actually started getting involved in racing, I can’t even pinpoint the exact moment but I somehow started following it, more from a sports betting perspective. I wanted to learn more and was intrigued about the game, about form and trying to figure it all out.
“Once I brought that up with my family, it came out that my uncle actually owned a couple of horses back in the day. I became an owner, I think I was 19, I went in with my uncle and a couple of his friends.
“They weren’t very good, to be very honest! I think, between my first two horses, neither of them found a place cheque. They were bred terribly, they were small, tiny individuals and I just didn’t know better but I wanted to be involved.
“That’s where the whole bloodstock interest started, I wanted to learn more and figure out what made a good horse and that’s where the quest for knowledge started. A lot of it for me has been self-taught, I’ve obviously crossed paths with a lot of people, certain trainers, certain agents, certain jockeys. I’ve just tried to feed off all these different people, learning whatever I can.”
One of Santos’ first roles was a jockey manager, where he initially came to notice in South Africa. His first client was champion apprentice Callan Murray, while reigning champion jockey Warren Kennedy and promising talent Keagan De Melo also feature among his stable of riders.
“Callan was coming out of the Academy and, while we weren’t the best of friends, we knew each other and we were acquaintances from our younger days; we grew up in the same area and went to the same primary school,” Santos recalled yesterday.
“When I saw he was involved in racing, I reached out and we started chatting while he was an apprentice. I’d help him out a little bit or we’d just have a chat about racing. He came out of his time as an apprentice and he was allowed an agent.
“I guess I was extremely lucky to have him as my first client. He said to me, I know you know the form backwards, should we give it a go? I jumped at the opportunity as it was a chance to get into racing and do a job that I enjoyed and loved and we haven’t looked back.”
Santos continued: “He had an extremely good first six months, he was riding predominantly for Mike de Kock, he had the backing of the big stables and he was hot property. It all culminated in the famous day at Turffontein in 2017 where he rode the three Group 1 winners a month after breaking his Group 1 duck. He won the Computaform Sprint on Rafeef, who has now gone on to be a stallion and he won the Nursery on Mustaaqeem, who was Rafeef’s brother; they were both out of National Colour, whose final foal went through the Magic Millions ring earlier this month.
“Callan then completed the treble by winning the Premier’s Challenge, which was the biggest-pursed race in the country at that stage, on Deo Juvente. He was 60/1 and he beat Legal Eagle and Nother Russia, the two best horses in the country at the time and real champions, in what was a thrilling three-way finish. That was the birth of Callan Murray onto the scene. The next morning, he got a call from the Hong Kong Jockey Club, he went over there and that was that. That was the start of my agent career.
“Since then, I’ve worked with a couple of other jockeys, most notably Warren Kennedy. I was able to win my first title as an agent with Warren this past season, it was his first title too. It was affected by Covid but he still won it comfortably and had Covid not hit, we thought he could break the record for most winners in a season.
“I also work with Keagan De Melo in Cape Town, he’s a sensational jockey. He’s had his best season here the last season and the constant travelling to Cape Town helped a lot. He’s got a nice job now with Dean Kannemeyer Racing and it looks to be going from strength to strength for him.”
While Santos gets great satisfaction as a jockeys’ agent, he sees bloodstock or racing management as a potential future avenue.
“I’ve got a nice book of jockeys currently and I will look to do their rides in the near future,” he said. “I probably don’t see myself booking rides for the rest of my life, though. I would like to get into the bloodstock side of things.
“The tough thing with being a jockey’s agent is that, once they leave and better themselves and get the international contract, there’s not much you can do. You want them to do their best and you want them to succeed but you can’t jump on a plane and be their agent wherever they go.
“With bloodstock, you have the ability to create those international ties. The game is getting so global that you can buy horses for international clients or you can sell South African horses to international clients, which I’ve done a bit already. It can be lucrative.
“Something I’d also love to do is to be a racing manager. I know it’s quite big in Australia in terms of the stables, most of them have dedicated racing managers, that’s a role that I think I would be suited by, being very connected to the form. That would be the dream, to have a big string to manage for somebody and to have input into the purchasing of their horses.”
Australia still in vogue in South Africa
Australia remains a strong source of bloodstock for South African buyers, with trainer Mike de Kock a prolific advocate for the Australian thoroughbred.
“Through Mike de Kock and his connections with Sheikh Hamdan and Shadwell, Australian horses have been part of South African racing for the long time,” Santos said. “It was a big help to get international blood into South Africa and Australia played a big role in that. Mike has got a sensational record, I remember him telling me that, at one of the sales in Australia, he’s got a crazy statistic – I can’t remember the exact numbers but he had an incredible stakes winners to purchases ratio.
“A lot of those were for the Sheikh, but Mike also started having other owners who were interested in Australian bloodstock and purchasing horses from there.”
One of those is Mount Pleasant (Vancouver), who became the first stakes winner for his sire when he took out the South African Nursery (Gr 2, 1160m) at Turffontein in June.
“He’s two from two currently and a Group 2 winner already as a two-year-old,” Santos said. “He’s going to be one to watch this season at three.
“Again, he’s another on the list of Group winners that Mike de Kock has had that are sourced from Australia. Australian families and their bloodstock industry has been really pivotal in improving the quality and diversity of our bloodstock.
“It might have slowed down a little bit, which I’m sure is partly due to the rand getting a lot weaker, but we still have Australian-breds running around and doing Australia proud on South African racetracks. I’d like to see it increasing again in the coming years.”
Australian-bred stallions are emerging among South Africa’s stallion ranks, while South Africa’s leading mares are often finding a home across the Indian Ocean. Long-term flagbearer National Colour (National Assembly) died in 2018, but Santos believes there may be another champion mare now in the Hunter Valley who can take her place.
“National Colour has been such a great producer with Rafeef and Mustaaqeem and I look forward to seeing what her final foal does,” Santos said. “Perhaps the next great South African producer in Australia can be Carry On Alice, who was a five-time Group 1 winner and who is also based at Arrowfield Stud. She produced a Snitzel colt last year in her first season at stud and she was back visiting Snitzel again last year.
“There’s a lot of Australian blood at stud in South Africa, through the likes of Rafeef and Gimmethegreenlight, that’s going to filter down into the rest of our ranks. If you follow South African racing from Australia, you’d be surprised by how many of the families and the pedigrees you would know.”
Hawwaam to fly the SA flag?
While Australian purchases heading into South Africa to race is fairly straightforward, the arduous journey out of the country heading abroad is complex and long overdue a resolution.
Due to a European Union directive in 2013, which determined that South Africa was unable to ensure the absence of African horse sickness in the areas from which horses were being exported, the country has been unable to export horses directly to other jurisdictions.
The ability to import and export horses is taken for granted in most countries. Even a country like Australia, which has notoriously strict quarantine protocols, has nothing on South Africa, with direct importation and exportation a given.
“In order to export horses, you have to ship to Cape Town, then you have to spend 21 days there before you fly to Mauritius,” Santos explained. “A horse then has to spend 60 days there in Mauritius before flying to Europe. I think we fly directly into France and from there to the destination.
“However, depending on where you are going – whether that’s Singapore, Hong Kong, Dubai or Australia – there’s additional time on that. I think Australia is the most strict, but it takes the best part of six to nine months to travel anywhere.
“You are taking a horse that is at the peak of their career and essentially not giving them any work for six to eight months. It’s unsustainable. Could you imagine Cristiano Ronaldo being out of football for a similar period, not being able to sprint or get his heart rate up? Just walking around in a circle, kicking a ball around and then being asked to line up in a Champions League final for Juventus? It’s a big ask.”
The shutdown came after a prosperous decade for South African horses on the world stage, led by Mike de Kock. Among his South African Group 1 winners that he campaigned on the world stage were Ipi Tombe (Manshood), Greys Inn (Zabeel), Irridescence (Caesour), Sun Classique (Fuji Kiseki), Musir (Redoute’s Choice) and Igugu (Galileo).
Even after the new protocols created a logistical headache, de Kock still had Group 1 winners globally, including Vercingetorix (Silvano) and Variety Club (Var). However, the champion trainer has cooled on shipping horses out in favour of waiting for the protocols to change.
After years of work by South African Equine Health and Protocols, led by Adrian Todd and Dr John Grewar, the European Union had set a date to conduct another audit in April, one that was widely expected to pave the way for simpler protocols. However, the Covid-19 pandemic has cruelled any hope of the audit taking place any time soon.
“A big aim for us in South Africa is to get horses out to Australia,” Santos said. “One of those who has done it recently is Surcharge, whose name there is Yulong Prince. He’s running in Australia for Chris Waller currently. I’d like to see a lot of horses go the other way, but that all comes down to quarantine.”
One horse who may potentially be seen in Australia after going through the tribulations of the quarantine process is de Kock’s Hawwaam (Silvano), an imperious enigma with all the talent in the world. The fact that the trainer is willing to undertake the quarantine procedure speaks volumes to his faith in the five-year-old.
A ten-time winner from 13 starts, Hawwaam has won five Group 1 races, including the Champions Challenge (Gr 1, 2000m) twice. However, he has also shown a penchant for acting up, which saw his withdrawal at the gates before last year’s Durban July (Gr 1, 2200m), a race for which he was the hot favourite.
“I’m really excited by this horse, I think he’s matured,” said Santos. “He is a quirky character but I think, with age, he’s learning to handle himself a lot better. I think he’ll just keep improving which is a trademark of his sire Silvano.
“I think his last performance was probably his best performance. Everyone wrote him off a bit because he didn’t perform in Cape Town over the summer but it’s an incredibly difficult trip going from Johannesburg down to Cape Town. The altitudes are different, the travel times are insane. He wasn’t himself at all and he was still running decent races in Group 1s against some of our best horses.
“I think he’s a very, very good animal over 1800 metres to 2000 metres. I think at the 1600 metres he might just find one better, but I think that the 1800 metres to 2000 metres is his optimum trip.”
The second foal out of Halfway To Heaven (Jet Master), Hawwaam has continued his dam’s prominence, with the mare proving to be one of the ultimate blue hens of world racing in recent years.
“Halfway To Heaven has proven to be amazing,” he said. “She’s had Rainbow Bridge, a three-time Group 1 winner; Hawwaam, who has won five Group 1s; and Golden Ducat, who won the Group 1 Cape Derby and was fourth in the Durban July this past season. That’s from her first three foals. It’s just incredible.
“The latest sibling, who was a full-brother to Hawwaam, was sold for 6 million rand at the recent National Yearling Sale. He was bought by Henning Pretorius, who is a major player in the warmblood game; he purchased Summerhill Stud from Mick Goss. He made a massive splash at the National Yearling Sale, which is a major positive for South African racing as it is new blood into the sport and everyone was unsure if he would support the industry. He clearly is, judging by what he spent. It was a great sale in that we had new local money into the industry.”
Hawwaam’s path once he completes quarantine is unclear. He is likely to emulate his sire Silvano (Lomitas), who traversed the world in 2001, winning the Arlington Million (Gr 1, 10f) before finishing fourth in the Cox Plate (Gr 1, 2040m), but which of those races he contests remains to be seen.
“I know Mike is keen to get him to Australia because he thinks he’s the kind of horse to excel over there, but there are currently obstacles to going to Australia. He’s currently in Cape Town, he will go to Mauritius, go to Europe and from there, they will decide where he goes,” he said.
“Australia is one option, the other is to go to the US and to the Arlington Million. It’s a race Mike won but then lost in the stewards’ room with The Apache, but it was cancelled this year and who knows whether it will be back on the calendar.
“I think he’s good enough, I hope that the travel doesn’t take it out of him as it has done with some of our top horses. If the true South African Hawwaam pitches up on the world stage, I think he’ll be very competitive. He’s the right type of horse – he’s got the talent, he’s shown it numerous times.”