The Pride of The Everest
Since 2020, Joe Pride’s affinity for The Everest has yielded his runners $14.1 million in prize-money, and now a winner of Australia’s richest race.
Over a 23-year training career, Joe Pride has forged a reputation for turning affordable horses into star performers, but the emergence of Think About It (So You Think) as a winner of The Everest (1200m) sets a new benchmark.
A $70,000 yearling buy for Pride and his great supporters at Proven Thoroughbreds, the five-year-old has now earned just short of $11 million in an extraordinary 12-start career. No horse in Australian racing history has earned that much money by their 12th start and Think About It now sits eighth on the all-time earners’ list.
He is also the greatest money-spinner of Pride’s career, just over $2 million clear of Private Eye (Al Maher), who finished third behind his stablemate on Saturday.
Private Eye cost just $62,500 and has returned $8.9 million to his owners across 29 starts. He may be an Epsom Handicap (Gr 1, 1600m) winner, but his two biggest paydays have come in the two editions of The Everest he has contested. He banked $2.3 million by finishing second behind Giga Kick (Scissor Kick) last year and a further $2 million for his third place last Saturday.
Pride’s other runner in The Everest has been Eduardo (Host), who ran in the race on three occasions and finished third behind Nature Strip (Nicconi) in 2021, earning a $1.4 million cheque.
He was reportedly purchased for $140,000 as a tried horse by Pride ahead of his seven-year-old season and then earned over $7.6 million for his new connections in 21 starts, including two Group 1 victories.
Across those three horses, Pride and his connections invested $272,500 and have yielded $27.5 million in prize-money, all since 2020. That simply amazing return is made possible by the jackpot that is The Everest.
The $14.1 million Pride’s horses have banked in the past four editions of The Everest makes up 15.3 per cent of the $92 million in career prize-money earned by the stable. In comparison, the six runners that Pride have had in that race represent only 0.08 per cent of his overall starters since he began his training career in 2001.
Joseph Pride’s runners in The Everest
| Horse | Purchase price | Prize-money | Everest results | Everest prize-money |
| Think About It | $70,000 | $10,979,175 | 1st | $7,549,000 |
| Private Eye | $62,500 | $8,871,810 | 2nd, 3rd | $4,300,000 |
| Eduardo* | $140,000 | $7,926,650 | 3rd, 11th, 11th | $2,293,750 |
| Total | $272,500 | $27,777,635 | $14,142,750 |
* Private purchase – Eduardo earned $307,550 for previous ownership
But if any trainer was going to eke a 100-fold return on initial investment across a trio of horses, it would be Pride. Six of the 11 Group 1 winners he has trained in his career were sold as yearlings and the average price of those horses has been $80,917.
Pride’s first stakes winner, albeit a horse he inherited from Neville McBurney, was Viva La Vie (Wallenda), a NZ$28,000 yearling, while his second – another cast-off – was Irongail (Canny Lad), who cost $30,000 as a yearling.
His first Group 1 winner was homebred Red Oog (Brief Truce), a relatively humbly bred sprinter, while his second elite success came from Regal Cheer (Arena), who cost $85,000 as a yearling.
Pride’s most expensive Group 1 winner as a yearling purchase was Vision And Power (Carnegie), who cost owner Nick Moraitis $210,000, but who the trainer didn’t get a hold of until he had 19 starts for just one win at the start of his five-year-old season.
It took Pride another 18 months, and another 20 starts, to get Vision And Power his first stakes win, but as a six-year-old, he would rise quickly to win the George Ryder Stakes (Gr 1, 1500m) and Doncaster Handicap (Gr 1, 1600m).
When he arrived with Pride, Vision And Power had won $60,775, and when he retired, he had earned a further $2.01 million.
Around the same time, Pride inherited a mare from Anthony Cummings called Sacred Choice (Choisir), who had won two races and $43,480 in prize-money. She had initially been a $40,000 yearling.
Sacred Choice thrived in her new environs and would win two Group 1 races for Pride, the Myer Classic (Gr 1, 1600m) and the Doncaster Handicap (Gr 1, 1600m). Under his guardianship, she banked $2.1 million in 30 starts.
Pride’s next three Group 1 winners, Steps In Time (Danehill Dancer) – who came from another stable, Tiger Tees (Dubawi), and Terravista (Captain Rio) were all homebreds; while his other elite winner is Mariamia (Toronado).
She was initially a $18,000 yearling and joined the Shane Stockdale stable, with whom she won four races and nearly $250,000 in prize-money. Stakes-placed, she was sold through Inglis Digital to Newhaven Park for $335,000 in March 2022 and transferred to Pride.
With her new stable, Mariamia has now won just over $1 million, including this year’s The Galaxy (Gr 1, 1100m), which added a massive tick to her ongoing broodmare value for Newhaven Park.
Purchase prices of Joseph Pride’s Group 1 winners
| Horse | Yearling Price | Subsequent Price | Prize-money earned for stable |
| Think About It | $70,000 | N/A | $10,979,175 |
| Mariamia | $18,000 | $335,000 | $1,017,200 |
| Private Eye | $62,500 | N/A | $8,871,810 |
| Eduardo | Homebred | $140,000 | $7,619,500 |
| Terravista | Homebred | N/A | $2,667,255 |
| Tiger Tees | Homebred | N/A | $1,247,250 |
| Steps In Time | Homebred | N/A | $410,000 |
| Sacred Choice | $40,000 | N/A | $2,108,140 |
| Vision and Power | $210,000 | N/A | $2,011,900 |
| Red Oog | Homebred | N/A | $1,188,385 |
| Regal Cheer | $85,000 | N/A | $885,955 |
With 17 Group 1s and an Everest under his belt, you would think that world domination might be on Pride’s radar, but he has always kept his stable numbers and runners under a tight rein.
While he is currently the second highest earning trainer in 2023-24, behind only Chris Waller, he has had just 91 runners, placing him 50th of all Australian trainers, while with 10 winners, he is 64th on the Australian trainers’ premiership.
Last season, he ranked 27th in Australia on winners and 39th on overall runners, but ninth on prize-money.
Pride is leading all trainers in Australia this season when it comes to the metric of prize-money per runner. He ranked third in that category last year (more than 50 runners), behind only Clayton Douglas and James Cummings, and was fifth in 2021-22.
Clearly, his success in The Everest has played a role in that but the other aspect is that Pride has a relatively high stakes-wins ratio to overall wins of 11.1 per cent. He has 129 stakes wins on his resume, with his highest total in a season coming in 2014-15 when he had 17.
This season, he has only had two stakes winners, with The Everest still not included in the pattern, but he is well on track for his most lucrative season with $11.15 million already banked from his runners.
Joseph Pride’s seasonal statistics since 2014-15
| Season | G1 wins | Stakes wins | Wins | Prize-money |
| 2023-24 | 0 | 2 | 11 | $11,149,600 |
| 2022-23 | 3 | 8 | 62 | $13,328,425 |
| 2021-22 | 1 | 10 | 59 | $9,325,785 |
| 2020-21 | 2 | 10 | 62 | $5,867,550 |
| 2019-20 | 0 | 3 | 66 | $3,338,605 |
| 2018-19 | 0 | 9 | 72 | $4,384,610 |
| 2017-18 | 0 | 6 | 64 | $3,262,515 |
| 2016-17 | 1 | 7 | 52 | $3,905,625 |
| 2015-16 | 0 | 4 | 69 | $4,296,997 |
| 2014-15 | 1 | 17 | 88 | $5,750,968 |