The Wine Steward, is expected to be one of the top contenders in next week’s Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile. Coglianese Photos.
By Teresa Genaro
The owner of Sequel Stallions in Hudson, NY, Becky Thomas is one of the sharpest, most experienced breeders and businesswomen in the game, but when she talks about The Wine Steward, a hint of sentimentality creeps into her voice.
“Everyone involved with this horse is either a friend or part of my family,” she said, back home in Florida after attending last week’s Fasig-Tipton Kentucky October yearling sale.
Thomas co-bred the Vino Rosso colt, who is headed to the $2 million FanDuel Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (G1), with Mark Toothaker and Lewis Lakin, both of whom she’s known for decades. She and Lakin have been doing business together since the mid-1990s, and her relationship with Toothaker goes back as far.
The Wine Steward as a foal with Dam Call to Service at Sequel New York. Photo Barbara Livingston.
“We’ve been really, really good friends for like 25 years or something,” she said.
Toothaker is the stallion sales manager at Spendthrift Farm, where Vino Rosso stands for $20,000. He and Lakland went in for 25% of The Wine Steward’s dam when Thomas bought her in foal to Vino Rosso for $110,000 at the 2020 Keeneland November sale of breeding stock.
“She’s a big, very pretty mare,” said Thomas of Call to Service (To Honor and Serve), who was bred by Allen Poindexter. “Allen had the whole family, and they’re all really pretty.”
Thomas eventually bought Toothaker out, keeping 15% of his share for herself, with her son-in-law Carlos Manresa, Sequel’s director of operations, taking the other 10%.
Thomas remembers The Wine Steward as “a very attractive colt and kind of an immature baby” that, once he grew up a little, trained beautifully on both dirt and synthetic surfaces.
The bay colt sold as a yearling at the 2022 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale of New York-breds, bringing $70,000 from Oldham Bloodstock. Pinhooked at this year’s OBS March sale of two-year-olds in training, he significantly improved on that sale price, selling for $340,000 to trainer Mike Maker, who bought the colt for owners Paul Proscia’s Paradise Farms and David Staudacher.
“We have a process for buying horses at the sales, and we set criteria, but ultimately, Mike makes the decision,” said Proscia. “We set a range for certain horses, and I’ll push the envelope a little bit if there’s a bidding war.”
Which is exactly what happened with The Wine Steward.
“The bidding kind of slowed at $250,000, and there must have been somebody else who really wanted him who pushed the price up a bit,” said Proscia. “I’m not sure I’d have gone any higher, but that’s a moot point now.”
The Wine Steward broke his maiden by six lengths at Belmont Park in his first start, and Maker immediately stepped the colt up to stakes company. A 2 3/4-length winner in the Bashford Manor Stakes at Ellis Park in early July, he returned to state-bred competition to eke out a head win in the Funny Cide Presented by Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital Stakes at Saratoga Race Course at the end of August.
Then Proscia and Maker brought him back to Kentucky, deciding it was time to stretch him out and take a shot at earning a spot in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.
The Wine Steward, would enter the Grade 1 Breeders Cup Juvenile with 3 wins from 4 starts. Including a 2 and 3/4-length victory in the Bashford Manor at Ellis Park. Coady Photography.
“Mike knew the horse would be better going long, and we could have taken an easier spot before running him in a Grade 1,” said Proscia, referring to the 1 1/16-miles Claiborne Breeders’ Futurity (G1) at Keeneland on Oct. 7, in which The Wine Steward was a three-quarter length runner-up. “We needed to qualify, and we thought we could compete.”
“It was very exciting,” he continued. “He dug in in that race, he didn’t give up, and he deserves a shot.”
Proscia has owned horses since 1989 and is no stranger to the New York-bred program. On Sunday’s New York Showcase at the Belmont at the Big A meet, Proscia and Staudacher will be represented by Barese, a four-year-old colt by Laoban and a multiple stakes winning earner of more than $500,000. Also bred by Thomas and Lakland, Barese is entered in Sunday’s Empire Classic.
“I’m a big believer in the New York-bred program,” he said. “I’ve had many nice New York-breds win big races for me.”
And perhaps, on Friday, Nov. 3 at Santa Anita Park, another of his really nice New York-breds will win another big race, the biggest of Proscia’s career as a horse owner.
