HAIL TO THE KING
In reality, I should be working on a Mercedes-Benz book now, but having tapped away on the keyboard for a couple of hours, I've concluded I'm simply not in the mood - sorry, Hannah! With a couple of hours to spare before I once more become taxi driver for the kids, I figure it's high time we lightened the atmosphere of the blog again, so hail to the king. Actually, it's Hail To Reason that I want to talk about. But for me, he's the king of Thoroughbred stallions, so the article's title seems quite fitting - it also has a nice ring to it in a journalistic kind of way...

Hail To Reason was born in 1958 - the year in which Pele made his name on the soccer pitch, and at the other end of the inspiration scale, The Chipmunk Song was released on vinyl, numbing the senses of an unsuspecting public. Sired by Turn-To, after nine wins (including victories in seven Stakes races), his career on the track came to a premature end when he lost a shoe in training and broke his leg. Thankfully, he was allowed to stand as a stallion, and gave the world the likes of Roberto, Halo and Bold Reason to name but a few.

What's interesting for me is whenever people hold up Sunday Silence as the bloodstock that put Japanese racing on the map, I see Hail To Reason. Again, for Brian's Time, the father of Mayano Time (aka 'Jaguar' or 'The Difficult Horse' depending on the time of day!) and another legendary sire in Japan, I see Hail To Reason blood. It's the same thing for so many of the current stallions proving to be popular in the Land of the Rising Sun - more often than not, there's a fair percentage of Hail To Reason blood somewhere in the equation. As such, I shall be particularly interested to see how Lourdes No Hitomi - a Hail To Reason cross (4Sx4D) - runs in her first race, which should be coming up soon. I've also just learnt that another Hail To Reason cross - one of the new Carrot Club yearlings - is coming my way, too. We'll now be able to see more clearly than ever if my theory is correct over the next few seasons.