When the gates release at Tabcorp Park Menangle at 8.50pm on Saturday there will be plenty of hearts in mouths as paths to the Chariots Of Fire will accelerate or cease, and among hopeful connections will be the many involved with Victorian entrant Fourbigmen.
One of three Emma Stewart and Clayton Tonkin representatives, Fourbigmen will also carry the hopes of owners Stokie Racing Group, Sue Murray, Fred Crews, Willow and Peter Tonkin, as well as others who were there in the beginning but have more recently watched from afar.
Wayne Schulze is among that number, having with former breeding partner Dale Eastman serviced mare Aleppo Heiress with late Alabar stallion Mach Three to produce Fourbigmen, who starts from gate two in Saturday’s Cordina Chickens Paleface Adios Stakes.
“I keep an eye on him all the time,” Schulze said. “I think Fourbigmen has been just below that top class, but one of the things Dale and I have seen with our horses generally is they only improve as they get older.”
For Schulze’s breeding ambitions, Saturday could prove a landmark night in a trots story that stretches back more than a decade and began in tragic circumstances.
“I had a horse being trained by Dale, a horse called Three Corner Jack,” Schulze said. “He had his first race start at Moonee Valley and we drove the four hours down there.
“Unfortunately he had an aneurysm at the top of the main straight and died. He was the first horse I had bred and was so disappointed to lose him.
“After that Dale and I vowed we’d try and find a good horse. We spent three months making phone calls all over Australia and ended up buying a mare off Daryl Wegmann and she turned out to be Aleppo Lady.”
She would win 13 of her 35 starts and light a spark.
“In her early days she showed a lot of form and I said to Dale that she had a full-sister by Safely Kept, which was Insulated. Arthur Graham at Nyah owned her. We went up and bought her to have her as a broodmare.”
The $2500 purchase would produce dividends, initially with a flirtation with a racing career and later in the breeding barn.
“We sent her to a pre-trainer, she didn’t show him a lot, and then we sent her to Andy Gath, who had four starts with her and won three of them,” Schulze said. “He said while it’s not good enough to win an Inter Dominion, it’s good enough to be in one.”
Unfortunately injury halted Insulated’s career and she wouldn’t race again, which instigated her broodmare career.
“She trotted but was pacing bred. Dale was keen to breed trotters and I was keen to bred pacers, so we decided to go gait for gait.”
The first offspring was Sundon trotter Aleppo Sunrise, who would win a clip over $200,000 including the 2012 Group 2 Breeders Crown Graduate Free For All, and then the second was Aleppo Heiress, a filly out of pacing stallion Armbro Operative.
She would win four of 16 starts but make her biggest impact as a broodmare, with her second foal being a colt who would fetch $50,000 at the 2017 Melbourne Australian Pacing Gold sale and become Fourbigmen.
A 12-time winner, Fourbigmen has thus far earned owners $132,220 in stakes, including placing in his three-year-old Vicbred Super Series final, and become a great success story for his breeders.
But he is only one piece of the joy the Insulated line would bring.
Aforementioned Aleppo Sunrise and Aleppo Heiress preceded Group 1 placegetter and Group 3 winner Aleppo Midas (by Sundon), a winner of $142,804.
An outstanding career, but it is her first foal who may yet change the Australasian trotting landscape. Schulze and Eastman’s Majestic Son colt was sent to the 2017 Australasian Premier Trotting Sale with a lofty reserve.
“It was the first time I’d been at the sales, I had no idea what to expect,” Schulze said. “I put $40,000 on him, and then watching the horses be sold for less I was that nervous I could barely write $40,000 on the ticket.”
The hammer would fall for $48,000 and the trotter, later named Alpha Male, would be the first squaregaiter purchased by the powerful Stewart and Tonkin camp.
Prodigiously talented, ailments have thus far restricted the trotter to five starts that have returned three wins, including the Group 1 Need For Speed, plus two placings, when he recovered after breaking in his first two races.
“I remember reading Tom Hogan said in an article that he could be as good as Maori’s Idol, and if he gets a chance he might be right, he might be a superstar,” Schulze said of Alpha Male.
“I’ve just been waiting for him and reckon once he gets out there he’s going to set the joint on fire.”
He has had to be patient, but there are signs of progress. Stewart said today Alpha Male was “back and fast working”.
“(He) looks like a beast,” she said. “He has come back unreal. (We) will take him slow and hopefully he is ready for some big races later in the season.”
Notably, Alpha Male’s little brother Timothy Red, a colt by Muscle Hill, will make his Australian debut at Bendigo tomorrow night for trainers Joe and Mary Rando and his owners, who paid $65,000 to snap up the 2018 Australasian Premier Trotting Sale entrant.
Aleppo Midas’ third foal, a two-year-old Love You filly, remains with Schulze, who plans to race her and, down the track, breed from her.
“All she wants to do is trot,” he said of the filly, who has had education campaigns with Joe Thompson ahead of a likely start to her race career early in her three-year-old season.
The above is just a small snapshot of the good fortune a good mare can bring and doesn’t even take in that Insulated also foaled Aleppo Murphy ($79,340) and Group 2 winner Aleppo Jewel ($107,185), as well as spawning further generations.
For example, Aleppo Heiress’ second foal after Fourbigmen was only recently snapped up at the February 2 Australian Pacing Gold sales – only the fourth Schulze-Eastman bred horse to go to auction and the third purchased by a Stewart stable connection.
“He’s by Art Major, they paid $37,000 for him, which just made the reserve and he has gone to the right camp,” Schulze said of the colt, who was purchased by Tom Hogan.
“He was a late foal but is well grown. Clayton’s description was he just looked a bit immature. He was a really nice colt and has gone to the right place and I hope he can produce what Fourbigmen has.”
The returns at the sales and then in breeding bonuses that have followed from good on-track performances are more than just a nicety for Schulze, who’s love for the game is balanced with a business approach.
“We are just common people and the horses have to pay their way, which they are, or I can’t afford to be in it,” he said.
“For me and my wife (Wendy) it’s a break from the day-in, day-out hassle. We really enjoy coming down to Melton to watch our horses and meet the fantastic people involved in harness racing. We are always nervous, but that’s part of the thrill for us.
“I follow them at their trials, watch them every time they race – it’s part and parcel of what you want to do if you are in it.”
