Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Calumet looks to make more history with Happy Jack
Rich Strike, who gave Calumet Farm a record-extending 10th Kentucky Derby victory as a breeder, will not be in Baltimore on Saturday. But Calumet homebred Happy Jack is expected to be in the starting gate for the Preakness Stakes, looking to extend the historic operation’s record in the second jewel of the Triple Crown.
Happy Jack is by Calumet stallion Oxbow, who gave the farm its first Triple Crown victory under Brad Kelley’s ownership when he won the 2013 Preakness. Happy Jack carried the same black and gold colors to finish 14th in this year’s Kentucky Derby.
“Mr. Kelley runs a huge operation,” trainer Doug O’Neill said. “He has a lot of skin in the game. He loves his horses, and takes no shortcuts, and surrounds them with the best people he can find. If a horse is doing well and showing they can get in and compete against the finest, he is game that way. I love it. No guts, no glory.”
Calumet, which was founded by Warren Wright and successfully carried on by his widow, Lucille, and her husband, Admiral Gene Markey, bred 1941 Triple Crown winner Whirlaway and 1948 Triple Crown winner Citation, along with Derby winners Pensive (1944), Ponder (1949), Hill Gail (1952), Iron Liege (1957), Tim Tam (1958), Forward Pass (1968), and Strike the Gold (1991).
The year after Strike the Gold’s win, Calumet was sold at auction to Henryk de Kwiatkowski for $17 million. Two decades later, his heirs sold the farm to the reclusive billionaire Kelley for a reported $40 million. Rich Strike was bred by the current Calumet team and is by farm stallion Keen Ice out of Canadian champion Gold Strike. The colt was claimed away from the operation for $30,000 in his second career start last year.
Calumet comes to the Preakness as the race’s leading owner, with eight wins. In addition to Whirlaway and Citation, the farm was represented by Pensive, Faultless (1947), Fabius (1956), Tim Tam, Forward Pass, and, finally, Oxbow to kick off the Kelley era.
Oxbow, by Awesome Again and from the immediate family of champion Tiznow, was purchased by Calumet as a yearling. After finishing sixth in the 2013 Kentucky Derby and winning the Preakness, he finished a creditable second in the Belmont Stakes. He stood his first season at Taylor Made Farm in 2014 before Kelley, who previously raced and bred as Bluegrass Hall, consolidated his operations to the Calumet property, with the young stallion moving there beginning in 2015.
Oxbow is the sire of Grade 1 winner Hot Rod Charlie, who crossed the line third in last year’s Kentucky Derby, later placed second, before finishing second in the Belmont Stakes. He also is the sire of graded stakes winners Coach Rocks, Hopeful Treasure, and Oxy Lady.
Calumet is lucky to have Happy Jack representing its stallion in its colors. The colt was entered in the 2020 Keeneland November breeding stock sale as a weanling, but failed to draw a single bid in the ring. Since then, he is multiple graded stakes-placed, finishing third in both the Grade 2 San Felipe and Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby before the Kentucky Derby.
‘Minister’ has Winchell blood
Creative Minister was a 2 3/4-length winner of a salty allowance race at Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May, some seven hours before Epicenter carried the Winchell Thoroughbreds colors to a game second in the Kentucky Derby. The two colts will converge in the Preakness Stakes on Saturday. Creative Minister, who races for Fern Circle Stables, Back Racing, and trainer Kenny McPeek, is from a Winchell foundation family and will now seek to upset their star colt in the Preakness.
Creative Minister’s fourth dam is Carols Christmas, who the operation’s late patriarch Verne Winchell claimed for $25,000 in 1981. The Whitesburg mare went on to produce eight winners from as many starters, including Grade 1-winning millionaire Olympio and Grade 2 winner Call Now. Several of her daughters and granddaughters became prominent producers, most notably her Grade 2-winning granddaughter Fun House, Broodmare of the Year after producing Eclipse Award champion Untapable and Grade 1 winner Paddy O’Prado. Other branches of this family have produced Grade 1 winners Pyro and Cuvee, among others.
Call Now, by Wild Again, scored her biggest win in the Grade 2 Del Mar Debutante as a juvenile; she also was Grade 1-placed and was a stakes performer every season she raced. She went on to produce four winners from as many starters, including the Deputy Minister mare Winning Call, who produced multiple graded stakes winner Tapizar, winner of the 2012 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile for Ron Winchell.
Tamboz, from the first crop of the Winchells’ leading sire Tapit and out of Winning Call, is an older full sister to Tapizar. She was bred by Winchell Thoroughbreds, but sold as a yearling and changed hands several times before eventually selling to her current owner, Dell Ridge Farm, for $440,000 at the 2012 Keeneland November breeding stock sale, shortly after Tapizar’s Breeders’ Cup victory.
“We were pretty cautious about not letting go of much of that family,” said David Fiske, racing and farm manager for Winchell Thoroughbreds. “Obviously, we sold a few that we didn’t regret, and we kept many that we did. The whole family was ‘Don’t give up on them just because they didn’t run.’ We kept as many as we could, and greatly benefited over the years.”
Tamboz has proven another successful broodmare from the family launched by Carols Christmas. She is already the dam of Grade 1-placed Dolder Grand, graded stakes-placed Battalion Runner and Oceanwave, and stakes-placed Late Nite Mischief and Tiznoble. Oceanwave is already the dam of graded stakes-placed Ocean Breeze.
Creative Minister, by Creative Cause and out of Tamboz, was bred by Dell Ridge and sold for $180,000 to his current connections at the Keeneland September yearling sale. He has won twice from three outings, and the Preakness will be his stakes debut.