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Rags to Riches ran seven times
just like her….5 wins
Beat Curlin in the Belmont
first race an unsuited sprint – 4th
ran with a hairline fracture – 2nd
Tried to compete at four
but….injury came backThey really tried her
a giant causewaySad news for the track but exciting news to see she will be covered by Dalakahni.
Two Arc winners producing a future Arc winner? Perfect match
I’d have thought an Arkle winner more likely…………..
Which bookmaker opens up odds for the Dalakhani-Zarkava foal to win the 2013 Arc? 2013 or 2014?
Probably a huge generalization but great race mares don’t necessarily make successful broodmares. I would be a layer.
Colin
It’s the sort of decision that maintains the racing balance of spectacle and absurdity. Here we have a top class filly, never raced outside of France (and only once away from Longchamp), the equine world at her feet and she’s retired before being granted the opportunity to face challenges a little further from home. There’s no evidence whatsoever to say that she wouldn’t train on as a four-year-old and, despite the occasional slow start, she’s a lot more straight forward than the likes of Darjina.
No-one can say they didn’t expect it, but to have to sit and read the Aga Khan’s predictable ‘no-one will regret it more than me’ speech makes the decision much harder to accept. I suspect the Arc is seen as the ‘be all and end all’ for the Aga Khan though, having retired Sinndar, Dalakhani and now Zarkava almost immediately after winning the race (none of the trio having raced more than nine times).
But I don’t see that it makes perfect commercial sense to not keep Zarkava in training. With colts I can understand that a seemingly sub-standard season will have an adverse effect on subsequent covering fees (Azamour was allowed to continue at four, though he didn’t win the Arc), but how does that equate with fillies in a private breeding operation? Were she to finish second in half a dozen Group 1 races as a four-year-old, is she any less capable of producing top class progeny? As far as I am aware, genes don’t degrade on the basis of physical performance. The Aga Khan will occasionally sell one of his horses, of course he will, but as he breeds primarily for his own use then race records don’t really come into it, do they? If Zarkava produces a top class horse, he keeps it, if not then it will be offloaded to Evan Williams to not win with over hurdles.
If a horse such as Zarkava produced a colt of stunning quality – which there is every chance she will do, given that she’s to be covered by Dalakhani next year – would it ever be sold (thus rendering the decision to retire Zarkava purely economic), or would it be kept to maintain the Aga Khan’s bloodstock standard (thus rendering the decision to retire Zarkava pointless)?
Very well said Equitrack – you have summed it up beautifully.
I don’t believe that the Aga Khan regrets retiring her for one moment – if he really felt so strongly about it (and more strongly than the rest of us apparently
), he could just as easily have said that she will stay in training and race on as a 4 year old.Sadly, I am forced to conclude that the man does not have the "cojones" !
Predictable but hugely disappointing decision as she could have proved to be one of the all time greats. While undoubtedly brilliant Zarkava is only a 3yo and all her wins, 6 at Longchamp and 1 at Chantilly, were on right handed basically flat tracks and never on ground faster than good means she did have more to prove to establish herself as an all time great.
As for the stud reasons this would have been an understandable decision for a colt due to the possible impact on stud fees if it didn’t train on or improve but not for a filly being retained for private breeding.
I’m not surprised.
I expressed my views on the possibility of her retirement in the Arc thread (big races section).
Commercial decision? As someone previously stated, her brilliance on the racetrack does not guarantee success as a broodmare. Look at Bosra Sham.
Nothing left to prove? What nonsense. Ouija Board won seven Group Ones, two Classics, two Breeders Cup, achieving this in four countries, on three continents. She won every season she competed and claimed Group One success in three of them.
Zarkava won five Group Ones and two Classics. These were achieved in one country, on two tracks.
She’s the most talented filly I’ve ever seen. Sadly, she’ll never have the opportunity to reach the heights of Ouija Board and other great fillies – many of whom I never had the opportunity to see.
A pathetic, cowardly decision. The Aga Khan doesn’t deserve her brilliance.
Zarkava is the biggest waste of supreme talent I’ve ever seen.
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Why would you risk her status as one of the great fillys by risking her as a 4yo because im sure he has Monmartre to do the business abroad.
There are risks in keeping her in training.
She has been retired, so what. People should enjoy horses when they race. We saw her plenty of times in the two years to race. Think it is a bit much to say the Aga does not deserve her. He has done a lot for racing and invests a good deal. Zarkava has been well campaigned without fear of losing, at a variety of distances.
The Aga deserves success a lot more than a certain British trainer Bos.
One of the pleasures of flat racing is the newness of horses. Where as jump racing is good for the opposite.
Mark
Value Is EverythingIn my 100 Greatest Racehorses book it says how terribly disappointed the Aga Khan was when Petite Etoile was beaten in the Aly Khan Memorial Cup at Kempton; perhaps this resulted in him not wanting to keep horses in training..although I usually get annoyed at horses not being kept in training I can see that, having produced this amazing horse he would dearly love to see her progeny on the racetrack..I’d like to find out more about the bloodlines of his horses eg is Zarkova a descendant of Mumtaz Mahal? At least we know that, whatever decision he has made is a purely personal and not financial one.
I’ve just looked it up..also, throw in a bit of Mill Reef and Nijinsky and hey presto! can’t wait to see what she produces…
JA McGrath, in today’s Telegraph, calls the news ‘welcome’.
While most of us can understand the reasons why she’s been retired, for those racing fans who have no vested interest in her stud career there is no logical reason why one would ‘welcome’ the news that a horse whose continued participation would hve been a huge point of interest in 2009 has been retired.
What a bizzare way to greet the (arguably) premature retirement of the most exciting horse of recent years, welcome indeed. Fool.
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Jim McGrath is hardly famed for his sensibility though, is he? To be honest I find very little worth in anything he has to say, and his most recent comments are as absurd as the notion that he’s a valuable member of the Channel 4 racing team.
If you are fortunate enough to own a Ferrari or Aston Martin, do you keep it under lock and key so as not to risk chipping the paint or damaging the engine? Do you spend countless hours waxing lyrical to your golf-club friends about the mechanical masterpiece sitting at home, having never taken it out of the garage? Of course you don’t. As soon as you turn that key you are ready to, potentially, throw more than £100,000 away for the sake of selfish pleasures, but you do it because that’s the very reason you bought it. Perhaps the example of a kit car, which many people spend tens of thousands of pounds and hundreds of man hours on, is a more pertinent comparison to racing ownership, but the principle remains the same.
No fan of horseracing could ever consider the action of retiring an unbeaten, Arc-winning filly as ‘welcome’ and such decisions are taken to the detriment of the sport. And, when we’re treated to the all too familiar ‘no one will regret this more than me’ line, you begin to wonder exactly why you hold this sport so dear. Had the Aga Khan showed a little humility, admitted that the Arc is the only race he cares about winning and that Zarkava would be retired because she’d achieved all that he wanted her to, then I might have a degree of respect for him.
Perhaps it is the pretense that it was a difficult decision for him to retire her that annoys me so much, I don’t know, but there is little logic in the assessment of risk factors either. Obviously any horse can fall victim to injury, but why would that be any different now to at any stage of her career? She was unbeaten as a juvenile, and clearly top class, so why race her at three if the maintenance of almost regal bloodlines is your only concern? Why run her again as a three-year-old once you knew she had trained on, and could therefore produce potential Classic-winning progeny?
And why is life-threatening injury any less likely now that she has been retired? She could irreparably damage herself cantering round a field or when kicking out in her stable, and is presumably at huge risk (albeit ‘normal’) during pregnancy and when giving birth. If, god forbid, Zarkava fails to survive the delivery of a foal by Dalakhani, is racing any better off? Or has it been denied the opportunity to watch one of the most exciting animals of recent times proving herself against the best the world has to offer, prior to hopefully producing sons/daughters of a similar quality?
All the Aga Khan’s horses are are trophies, trophies only he gets to enjoy, and he’s too cowardly as to be able to admit it. I sometimes fail to agree with the decision to retire colts after their Classic season – lest they continue to win at the highest level – but in purely commercial terms I can understand it (not that the revenue it generates benefits me in any way, and as such I can only look at events from the perspective of a fan). With fillies, especially ones retired to a private breeding operation, there’s no such excuses.
Extremely disappointing, no matter how predictable it may have been. Racehorses are born to race (much like Ronseal, they do exactly what it says on the tin), and preventing them from doing so when they remain healthy beggars belief, and defies all sense.
Equitrack just to note that J A McGrath is the Australian version who is the BBC commentator.
JA McGrath, in today’s Telegraph, calls the news ‘welcome’.
While most of us can understand the reasons why she’s been retired, for those racing fans who have no vested interest in her stud career there is no logical reason why one would ‘welcome’ the news that a horse whose continued participation would hve been a huge point of interest in 2009 has been retired.
Yes Cormack, I entirely agree with you. I could not believe that he welcomed the decision and thought it was entirely the correct one. For the Aga Khan’s breeding interest fair enough, but for the promotion of racing as a great sport and a spectacle a complete non-starter.
I would have liked some explanation as to why he thought it was welcome news. Frankly a pretty poor bit of journalism what with it’s heavy emphasis on the Melbourne Cup which is a trait of the Telegraph at this time of year. I have to say it is a race that does nothing for me at all. Can you see the Australians getting that excited about the Ascot Gold Cup or even the Northumberland Plate?
), he could just as easily have said that she will stay in training and race on as a 4 year old.
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