Ryan Shares Breeding Keys, Plans for Be Your Best

Ryan, who breeds under the moniker St. Croix Bloodstock, spoke with BloodHorse about racing his own stock as a commercial breeder, the pedigree ideologies that have helped him cultivate a successful breeding program, and how he believes the best is yet to come for the improving Be Your Best.

BloodHorse: In addition to being a world-renowned bloodstock agent, you’ve achieved a great deal of success as a breeder. When did you begin breeding horses?

Mike Ryan: We’ve been breeding for 35 years. My greatest success was with Kentucky Derby winner Always Dreaming, who I bred with my late friend Gerry Dilger. We bred Hot Dixie Chick. We bred Positive Spirit. Both sisters to Always Dreaming. Gerry and I bought 3 or 4 mares out of the Classic Star Dispersal in 2006 and one of those was Above Perfection. When Gerry passed, it was the 24th of February in 2020 just as Covid was hitting. And we still have two siblings to Always Dreaming. We have his Curlin half-sister, Beyond Perfection who is due any day now she’s in foal to Into Mischief.

BH: Where do you keep most of your mares?

MR: I’ve kept most of my mares at Indian Creek for the last 12-14 years. Indian Creek has great land, some of the best land in Bourbon County. I do keep some mares in Ireland too, I have seven there. Ballylinch boards our mares in Ireland, it’s a fantastic farm.

I brought a few back though late in 2023, one of them being the dam of Be Your Best, Kamakura. She’s at Indian Creek now.

BH: As a commercial breeder, was racing Be Your Best an anomaly for you?

MR: We’ll race from time to time. We raced Mani Bhavan, and she won the Spinaway (G1) (in 2008) for us. We also bred More Than Real and we raced her. She won first time out at Saratoga and a few days later Bobby Flay called me and he bought her. She won that year’s Breeders’ Cup (2010 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf-G2T) for him.

We’re trying to make young mares, and we’ll keep a filly if we feel she doesn’t fit the marketplace. For example, Be Your Best, is a lovely filly but she’s by a sire who had fallen out of favor, Muhaarar, who has since recovered in the market. He was a little bit like Arrogate where his first crop didn’t really perform and then the second crop came along, and nobody wanted to buy them in September. But when his first crop became 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds they ran lights out. Muhaarar’s progeny didn’t meet expectations his first year because they hadn’t sold very well.

BH: Why do you believe it’s important to race some of your horses as a breeder?

MR: I will race fillies to try and help our young mares because we are commercial breeders and sometimes, they just aren’t ready for the marketplace. Either they’re not enough grown, or the sire may be out of favor. We enjoy racing and I would say it’s an integral part of our broodmare band. 

When you have a broodmare band you have to be prepared to race some of them in order to help the mares be successful because once you sell them as yearlings, they’re out of your control. You hope that they get into good hands and go to good owners and go onto good trainers. Once you sell them, you’re out of the picture, you’ve lost that control. 

I send my babies to break here in Ocala with Niall Brennan, we’ve been together for 40 years, and also break some at Stonestreet with Niall’s brother, Ian Brennan. He had More Than Real for me. I also send them to Karl Keegan, who broke Be Your Best. The beauty of having your own horses is being able to follow their development. In March, April, May, you can really see the progression of these young horses and figure out their level of ability and know what you have talent and ability-wise. You can figure out what racing circuits they best fit in whether it be at the top level in Kentucky or New York or that it be at the Mid-Atlantic region.

BH: What do you enjoy the most about breeding your own horses?

MR: I really enjoy the challenge of mating mares and trying to breed a good horse. We do sell most of our yearlings because we’re a commercial breeding operation and it has to pay for itself, but I enjoy trying to buy young mares, whether as yearling fillies or even fillies off the track that have quality on the female side. I’m very, very strict about that. I have to have quality female lines because I have found through the years that they keep perpetuating themselves.

I enjoy seeing the development of foals to their yearling year. It’s very rewarding when you breed a good horse, a graded stakes horse, it’s very fulfilling. And when you own it, like Be Your Best, it’s really, really special.

BH: How did you come to acquire Be Your Best’s dam, Kamakura?

MR: She was in the Tattersalls July Sale (BBA Ireland purchased Kamakura on Ryan’s behalf for $205,1122). She was in the Godolphin consignment. It’s a family I’m very familiar with. (Kamakura’s second dam) Flagbird is an unbelievable mare and (third dam) Up the Flagpole as well. If they aren’t Mr. (Bill) Farish’s best pedigrees, then they are at least from the top two families he’s ever bred. It’s a great, great family Mr. Farish developed: Prospector’s Deelites, Mineshaft, Runup the Colors, and Tomisue’s Delight. And now Godolphin has a few members of it. Kamakura never raced for Godolphin. I brought her back here and put her back in training and then decided ‘Let’s go ahead and breed her.’ And we sent her back to Europe. Her first foal was a Kingman colt, and he was a beautiful yearling. Having a quality female line was very important to me with Kamakura because she was unraced, we never even tried it. But her bloodlines were strong, and usually quality blood comes through in the next generation.

One of our best mares, Rose of Summer, I bought as a yearling. She was an El Prado mare. She toed in but was a beautiful mare. She fractured her shoulder in training and never got to race but she had a lot of pedigree, and pedigree usually goes on to repeat itself. She went on to be a tremendous broodmare. She produced Summer Front and Laragh. Laragh was a grade 1 winner for us, we raced her and then sold her. And Summer Front was a graded stakes winner and ran second in three grade 1s.

BH: Last year, Kamakura foaled a filly by Baaeed. What are your plans for that now-yearling filly?

MR: We have two Baaeed fillies now, one out of Kamakura and another by a mare named Sassy Little Lila (Artie Schiller). Our plan right now is to send them back to Ireland to Ballylinch either right before or right after the Derby and give them five months up to the Tattersalls October Book 1 sale. They’re both high-quality fillies and Baaeed was a superior racehorse in England, he won 10 of 11 starts. He was very well received at the December sale at Tattersalls. His first foals sold extremely well. He had the second-highest average behind Frankel.

(Kamakura’s daughter is) a big, strong filly. There’s a lot of Medaglia d’Oro to her. She’s early too, she foaled on the seventh of February last year. She’s very, very nice. Plenty of size, quality, leg, presence, correct. Seeing her and the other filly encouraged me to breed back to Baaeed because I’m so impressed with him.

(Kamakura is) in foal to Cody’s Wish, which is exciting and she’s going to be bred back to Nyquist this year.

BH: Be Your Best has been a stakes performer every year she ran for you from ages 2 to 5. What can you say about the journey this mare has taken you on?

MR: It’s been pretty special from the get-go. She won impressively at Saratoga first time out. Jose Ortiz came back to us and said, ‘This is my Breeders’ Cup filly’. And then she came back and won the P.G. Johnson (Stakes) in her second start.

We were a little unlucky with her last year as a 4-year-old, there were a few times the ground came up too soft and we elected not to run. We recognized that she’s best on very firm ground. She didn’t have many races last year. But 4 of her last 5 races have been very good.

We’ve also learned she wants to be forwardly placed. She breaks well and you have to let her be forwardly placed. She has a very high cruising speed, and she can accelerate off her high cruising speed. Particularly on firm ground, she just flies over the top of the ground. If it has some juice in it, her acceleration is not the same.

BH: She ran a career-best number in the Pegasus Filly and Mare Turf (Equibase Speed Figure of 111). Were you expecting a performance like that from her?

MR: I thought she would run very well. I was afraid of the Shadwell filly, Raqiya, who won the Goldikova. And Sacred Wish is a very nice filly, she was coming off a win in the Matriarch. I was hopeful though. I knew she would be competitive, and I thought she had an excellent chance at hitting the board. Even after that win, I feel she’s on the improve and I still think there’s more improvement there. She’ll get a nice break now before the Jenny Wiley April 12. She runs well fresh, she’s an easy horse to train, and is extremely low maintenance.

She’s at the top of her game right now. (Former trainer) Horacio (DePaz) did a great job. And then we moved her over to Saffie (Joseph Jr.) and he’s done an excellent job with her.

BH: What are your goals with Be Your Best for the rest of the year?

MR: Our whole goal is to win a grade 1 this year. We’ll look at the Jenny Wiley at Keeneland if all goes well. Hopefully we’ll have firm ground at Keeneland that day. We’ll take it one race at a time. Certainly, the Breeders’ Cup (Filly and Mare Turf-G1T) is one of the best races in the world for fillies, and there’s always strong foreign representation but firm ground is what she likes.