Earlier this year, trainer Cherie DeVaux had More Than Looks ready for his 2024 debut when he got a leg caught in his stall webbing and injured a tendon, prompting the trainer to remark how horses love to scuttle plans – a fact well known to anyone who works hands-on with horses.
More Than Looks scored a career-best victory in the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Del Mar, and co-owner Anthony Bartolo of Victory Racing Partners said immediately afterward that the owners intended to continue to race the colt as a 5-year-old. But More Than Looks was found to have reinjured that tendon in his right foreleg, forcing another change of plans. So instead of continuing to race, he will begin his stud career at Lane’s End Farm in 2025, where he will stand for an advertised fee of $15,000.
“It’s one of those things where he’s proven what he has,” DeVaux said. “It’s a long recovery.”
More Than Looks is from the third-to-last crop of More Than Ready, and Lane’s End – where DeVaux’s husband, agent David Ingordo, works as a bloodstock adviser – has played a major role in that stallion’s legacy in recent years. Despite More Than Ready’s prowess with his juveniles, More Than Looks was unstarted at 2, with his connections noting several times that his personality required patience.
Last year, the colt began to reward that patience by emerging as a consistent stakes performer, winning the Grade 3 Manila at Belmont Park; finishing third to Carl Spackler, who became a familiar foe, in the Grade 2 National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame at Saratoga; and winning the Jefferson Cup at Churchill Downs. He was sixth in the 2023 Breeders’ Cup Mile at Santa Anita, beaten two lengths in a tight finish.
After More Than Looks injured his tendon early this year, it was time to go to plan B, which would have the colt peaking for the Breeders’ Cup in his third start off a layoff. But yet another audible would have to be called along the way. More Than Looks was entered in the Lure Stakes in August at Saratoga, which was rained off the turf.
He was scratched and supplemented to the Grade 1 Fourstardave a week later, and was a solid second to Carl Spackler off the layoff. In October at Keeneland, he was again second to that foe, while cutting the margin late, in the Grade 1 Coolmore Turf Mile.
In the Breeders’ Cup Mile on Nov. 2 at Del Mar, More Than Looks, under Jose Ortiz, rallied from eighth in the stretch to best Johannes and favored Notable Speech by three-quarters of a length. He finally got the better of Carl Spackler, who was sixth. It was the first Breeders’ Cup win for DeVaux.
“It just took some maturing to get him to the races,” she said. “He had always shown an immense amount of talent. For me, he showed in the [2023] Breeders Cup that he belonged with the best in the world. This year, he obviously showed that he belonged.
“For me, he’s a horse that doesn’t come along regularly into our stable. It’s amazing the journey he took us on to get to the Breeders’ Cup and to win it.”
With the victory by More Than Looks, More Than Ready, a multi-hemisphere sensation, recorded his eighth Breeders’ Cup win, tying him for the most all time. More Than Ready, who died in 2022 at WinStar Farm, had previously recorded Breeders’ Cup winners on both dirt and turf, and around both one and two turns. His other Breeders’ Cup wins came with 2010 Juvenile Fillies Turf winner More Than Real; 2010 Juvenile Turf winner Pluck; 2011 Turf Sprint winner Regally Ready; 2017 and 2018 Sprint winner Roy H; 2017 Juvenile Fillies Turf winner Rushing Fall; and 2019 Mile winner Uni. Roy H, Rushing Fall, and Uni were all Eclipse Award champions.
More Than Ready shuttled for many years to Australia, where he sired top-level winners, including champions More Joyous, Phelan Ready, Samaready, and Sebring. He has sired champions in five other countries.
More Than Ready’s continuing influence is important as he has emerged as the biggest link in the United States to his grandsire, the mercurial Halo. The multi-time leading sire and classic sire is best known as the sire of 1989 Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes, and Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Sunday Silence, who stood his entire career in Japan after U.S. breeders showed little interest.
In Japan, Sunday Silence found his perfect gene pool and swiftly established a dynasty that still thrives through his sons and grandsons. As just one example, Forever Young, who had two prominent runs in the United States this year, is by Sunday Silence’s grandson Real Steel.
Many of Halo’s other prominent sons found their success as regional sires – including 1983 Kentucky Derby winner Sunny’s Halo in Texas – and thus did not get the chance to make a larger impact in the U.S. sire standings. Halo’s sons in Kentucky included champion Devil’s Bag, who was a useful, if not spectacular, sire, and multiple graded stakes winner Saint Ballado, who died early at age 13. In a tragic twist, Saint Ballado’s best son, Horse of the Year Saint Liam, was euthanized after breaking his leg in an accident while being led to his paddock – and although his lone crop included Horse of the Year Havre de Grace, he did not leave a quality son behind.
With the Japanese bloodstock industry experiencing a largely insular period as it grew, few of Sunday Silence’s sons stood out of the country or made their way back to North America.
More Than Ready is by Halo’s late son Southern Halo, who was Argentina’s leading sire multiple times and shuttled north of the equator to stand at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky. More Than Ready was a Grade 1-winning sprinter on dirt who proved remarkably versatile in his stud career.
More Than Looks will be the stallion’s lone Breeders’ Cup winner standing in the United States for Lane’s End, which has familiarity with the sireline in recent years. Grade 1-winning juvenile Daredevil began his career alongside his sire at WinStar before being sold to the Turkish Jockey Club. After his first crop included 2020 Preakness Stakes winner and Eclipse champion filly Swiss Skydiver and that year’s Kentucky Oaks winner Shedaresthedevil, he came back to the United States to stand at Lane’s End for several years, while still under Turkish ownership. He is the sire of six winners from his return crop of 2-year-olds this year, including Dare to Breeze, a Saratoga maiden winner who was stakes-placed at Woodbine.
Daredevil recently returned to Turkey to continue his stud career, leaving six sons of More Than Ready advertised at stud in the U.S.
More Than Ready’s son Funtastic, who stands at Three Chimneys Farm in Kentucky, is the sire of Grade 2 winner First Peace and Grade 1-placed stakes winner Funtastic Again from his first three crops. Rounding out a quartet of More Than Ready sons in Kentucky, Title Ready entered stud at Darby Dan Farm in 2023; his first foals arrived this year.
Catholic Boy and Copper Bullet, both by More Than Ready, were moved out of Kentucky for the upcoming 2025 season, to Harris Farms in California and Marjorie Farms in Texas, respectively. Custom for Carlos is well established, with more than a decade at Clear Creek Stud in Louisiana.
– additional reporting by David Grening