A first season stud fee will be announced early next week for recently retired super colt Pierro following a $30 million handshake which saw Coolmore strike a deal with owner Greg Kolivos.
Pierro winning the WFA Canterbury Stakes at Rosehill. Photo by Steve Hart.
Pierro will stand his first season at the famous Coolmore Stud in the Hunter Valley after the huge international breeding and racing organisation beat a hot field of local and overseas studs for the Lonhro colt’s services.
The exact details of the negotiations of Pierro’s sale weren’t revealed but Kolivos said that the family did retain a small share and will remain involved in the colt’s future.
“We could not let him go,” Kolivos said.
“We wanted to say involved with the horse in some capacity.
“Until we decided Pierro was retired – and that wasn’t done until Gai made the call last Sunday – we had not formally commenced any negotiations to sell the horse.
“But once we had made the decision that Pierro had run his last race, we started the process of finding him a new home. Coolmore seemed the perfect fit as they are one of the most successful breeding organisations in the world, they have a fabulous track record, and we can still go and visit the horse at the farm.
“If Pierro stands outside Australia, then if we go on a family trip, we can visit him there, too.”
Coolmore has stud operations in Ireland and United States and it would be a real possibility that Pierro will stand in the Northern Hemisphere at some stage of his stud career.
“We’ve followed Pierro’s career very closely ever since he made his debut and we’re thrilled that he is joining what is already an exceptional line up of stallions here at Coolmore Australia,” said Coolmore’s Michael Kirwan.
“He was a truly brilliant two-year-old equally effective at all distances from 1000 to 1600 metres. No other horse since 1970 has managed to secure the two-year-old Triple Crown while remaining undefeated through his first season and I understand that he’s the only Triple Crown winner to go on to win two G1 races at weight-for-age as a three-year-old.
Kolivos and trainer Gai Waterhouse decided to call an end to the racetrack career of Pierro after the colt was run down by Sacred Falls last week in the Group 1 $2m BMW Doncaster Mile (1600m) at Randwick.
Pierro, under 57kg, would have had to set a new weight carrying record for a three year old if he was to win the Doncaster after the Bart Cummings trained Tontonan carrier 56kg to win the 1600m Randwick feature way back in 1974 with Roy Higgins aboard.
With just over $4.5 million in prizemoney in earnings and five Group 1 wins, Pierro started off his illustrious career with an unbeaten first season which saw him crowned the champion two year old after winning the Group 1 Triple Crown by taking out the $3.5m AAMI Golden Slipper (1200m), $500,000 Inglis Sires Produce Stakes (1400m) and the $400,000 Moet & Chandon Champagne Stakes (1600m).
Pierro was then spelled and as a three year old ran second to All Too Hard in the $1m BECK Caulfield Guineas (1600m) before running third to Ocean Park in the $3m Sportingbet Cox Plate (2040m) at Moonee Valley in the Spring.
Then in the Autumn Pierro returned again to stamp himself as a top weight for age performer with wins in the Group 1 $350,000 Cellarbrations Canterbury Stakes (1300m) and the Group 1 $400,000 The Daily Telegraph George Ryder Stakes (1500m), both at Rosehill.
