Eureka Stud’s Scott McAlpine was in the saddle almost from the time he could walk, and his life has been focused on thoroughbreds and the family-owned stud on Queensland’s Darling Downs. The third generation of his family to manage Eureka, Scott, the subject of this profile, loves his life but is only too aware of the pressures on the smaller operations to survive in these tough times.

QUITE amazingly at 52 years of age Scott McAlpine has almost half a century of experience behind him in the thoroughbred industry. He was riding ponies by the time he was three and when he was only “six or seven” he began helping with the mustering of the mares on his family’s Eureka Stud, at Cambooya on Queensland’s Darling Downs, in the mornings before heading off to primary school.

  Then as Scott was undergoing his secondary schooling, he became increasingly aware that he had a consuming passion for the horse industry. At 16 he informed his father Colin he was wasting time and money being at school and that all he wanted was to become involved in the running of Eureka.

  Scott, who over the years since has earned a reputation as a no-nonsense straight shooter, is the third generation of the McAlpines on Eureka. One of the longest surviving family studs on the Australian thoroughbred scene, Eureka was created in 1936 by Scott’s grandfather Andrew McAlpine, after his purchase of 260ha at Cambooya. Originally part of the historic Harrow Station, the property is about 40km from Toowoomba, the largest inland city in Queensland.

  Now spreading over 550ha, Eureka is set on rich black soil and has the permanently flowing Hodgson Creek running through its boundaries. It was simply a bare block of land when originally taken over by Andrew, but after installing fencing and building some infrastructure, he first stood Iliad (GB) who had finished second to Blue Peter in the 1939 English Derby. He continued to stand a succession of stallions - including St Constant (GB), a leading sire of two year-olds in Queensland, and Gaekwar’s Pride whose progeny featured the 1959 AJC Australian Derby winner Martello Towers - through until 1963.

  That year Andrew sold Eureka to his son Colin and his wife Jill - Scott’s parents - who worked tirelessly to lift the stud’s profile. “I suppose the stallion that really put Eureka on the map was Lumley Road (GB), who was by Grey Sovereign,” Scott said. “My father bought him at the Newmarket sales in 1966. He was in great demand in his first few seasons, but then his popularity waned because he was not siring two year-old winners and we sold him. Not long afterwards he produced Grey Affair, the only horse to have won the Brisbane, Doomben and Queensland Cups.”

  The Blue Peter horse Messmate (GB), who sired such notable performers as Monte Cristo, Swell, Creolian and Pleasanton, helped to further enhance Eureka’s reputation along with the likes of Midnight Cowboy and Rascolnik (GB). A person completely devoted to the racing and breeding industry in Queensland, Colin was also particularly active in the state’s Bloodhorse Breeders’ Association while developing Eureka. His influence also spread to the Australian Bloodhorse Breeders’ Association of which he was chairman for many years. “There is no doubt my father has made an exceptional contribution to the thoroughbred breeding industry, especially in Queensland but I just didn’t feel particularly comfortable about following him onto the administrative side.”

  Scott has made a concession in that regard, however, by becoming a committee member of Tattersalls Club (Qld) in Brisbane. “It’s a very good club and I’ve been on the committee for five years. I am on the club’s race committee. We hold four meetings a year in Brisbane and they have been going very well.”
  However Scott did follow in his father’s footsteps as far as running Eureka was concerned.

Appreciating, by the late 1980s, that the stud would be in safe hands, Colin and Jill moved into Toowoomba to allow Scott to settle into the main homestead with his wife, Grania. “Looking back I suppose it was a bit unfortunate I haven’t worked anywhere else but here”, said Scott, “but I did manage to travel a bit. I had the opportunity, when we were buying horses for Iran in the late seventies, to get myself on the first flight of horses to Tehran and I spent a couple of exciting weeks there. I’ve been to Kentucky, and I did a lot of trips to England with International Racehorse Transport - so I have been around.”

  While he does have some regrets about not broadening his experience, Scott was immersed among horses, as he says, practically from the time he was born in Toowoomba in October 1957. He was in the saddle within a few years, and before long he was riding a pony the 10km from Eureka Stud to a one-teacher school at Umbiram: “There were only 25 children at the school and I’d ride there and back each day. I wore out a few ponies in the process.”

  He was also, as he says, involved in the activities on the stud from a very young age: “I was riding not long after I could walk, and before I was much older I used to have to muster the mares in the mornings. Then I’d help out when I came home from school in the afternoon. I know there are people who’ve ridden more than me, but I’ve covered a lot of miles on horseback over the years.”

  After completing his primary schooling Scott went, as his father had done before him, to Toowoomba Grammar School as a boarder. However, school was a slog and he soon realised an academic career was not for him: “I’d bought my first mare and sold my first yearling by grade 10. At the end of grade 11 I told father that he was wasting his money and my time leaving me at school. I told him I should go home. He agreed, and I went home and I’m still here.” At that stage he began working alongside Rex Lipp, now the leading trainer in Toowoomba. “Rex is six years older than me, but we became like brothers. He started at Eureka when he was 15 and he stayed for 17 years.”

  Scott was still a few months shy of his 20th birthday when he made the first of his numerous overseas trips, and he went to Tehran for a “memorable” two weeks. He made another “memorable” trip overseas in 1981when he accompanied Semipalatinsk on his flight “down under”: “We had been looking for a Star Kingdom-line horse that provided an outcross to the line that was so prevalent in Australia in those days,” he said. “Semi, who was by the Noholme horse Nodouble, came up. He had been bred in America, sold in America and had raced in Italy.

  “He arrived at Eureka as a three year-old and died here in 2006 when he was 28 years old. I have very fond memories of Semi because he was a wonderful horse for the stud. We won an AJC Oaks with Just Now who was Australasia’s Champion Three Year Old Filly, and a Magic Millions with Sea Cabin and both were by Semipalatinsk. He also sired horses like Memphis Blues, Eureka Jewel which we also raced, Palatious, Regal Half and Easy Now and he had stakes winners in every capital city in Australia apart from Darwin.”

  The success Semipalatinsk enjoyed as a sire was very timely for Scott because as the 1980s were progressing Colin and Jill were “more or less” easing out from the running of the stud to allow him his opportunity. At the same time the stud’s momentum was increasing, and two years after Semipalatinsk had arrived Scott again went overseas to accompany a stallion back to Eureka: “I went to America with a mate of mine, Andrew McNicoll, and then we went to Toronto in Canada, to fly home with No Faith who was by Noholme. While Semipalatinsk was a great horse for us No Faith probably didn’t quite make the grade, even though he still produced winners.”

  By then his father’s close friendship with the world-renowned Lindsay Park trainer and stud principal, the late Colin Hayes was well and truly cemented. The association had led to Eureka beginning to sell yearlings in Adelaide in 1975. “Colin gave us a lot of support and we sold horses in Adelaide for 23-odd years,” says Scott. “Dad also raced quite a few horses with him.”

  It was, in fact, at the Adelaide yearling sales in 1987 that Scott met his Irish-born wife Grania Watt, who had decided to experience life in Australia. Their initial friendship developed into a romance which flourished, and in October 1989 they were married in Port Salon in Donegal, and now have three boys. The eldest is Harry who is 19 and is studying international business and languages at Armidale University. His younger brothers - Angus, 16, and Charlie, 13 - are students at Toowoomba Grammar.
  “As well as looking after the children, Grania is very much involved in the day-to-day running of Eureka, and with the running of the office. My mother Jill and father ran the stud and now we do . . . it’s always been very much a family affair. My younger sister Jenny is also in the horse business in Melbourne in her position as marketing manager for David Hayes. She is also the Australian representative for Tattersalls, and she manages to put a group of 10 or 12 together to go over to the sales each year.”

  With their wide range of international contacts the McAlpines decided to venture into the shuttle stallion market in the mid-1990s. With Semipalatinsk nearing retirement age, Scott and Colin were able to arrange in 1995 for the Thatching horse Puissance (GB) who had won the Greenlands Stakes-Gr.1 at The Curragh, to stand at Eureka. The following year an Australian-bred - the Cossack Warrior horse Brave Warrior - was added to the roster. He stood only two seasons before, tragically, suffering a fatal injury in his day yard. From just 84 runners Brave Warrior has had 66 individual winners of the calibre of Glenlogan Park sire and multiple Gr.1 winner Show A Heart, Another Warrior, Dynamic Love, Scenic Warrior and Heroism - so his premature death was quite devastating for the McAlpines.

 “He was a Magic Millions winner and he looked to have the potential to make into a good stallion so he was a bad loss for us because, as everyone knows, finding a successful sire is not easy,” Scott said. Since then Air Express (IRE), Great Dane (IRE), Piccolo (GB) - whose filly Express Air, by Air Express, last year won the QTC Queensland Guineas-Gr.2 for the McAlpines - and Skalato, have had time on the Eureka roster leading through to the acquisition in 2007 of the latest incumbent Red Dazzler.

  A powerfully built, darkish bay son of Red Ransom, he was prepared by Mick Price to win the MRC Toorak Handicap-Gr.1, MVRC Bill Stutt Stakes-Gr.2 and MRC Vain Stakes-LR. His other efforts included seconds in the MRC Futurity Stakes-Gr.1 and AJC George Main Stakes-Gr.1. Red Dazzler is from the Danehill (USA) mare Vain Hill, who is from the Vain mare Vain Display who is in turn from the outstanding race and broodmare Toltrice, by Matrice.

  “Red Dazzler is owned by Singaporeans Melvin and Suat Foo, and we were contacted about the horse by bloodstock agent Denis Roberts. He told us the owners were looking for a family-owned stud where Red Dazzler would have a good opportunity to get going as a sire. They also wanted to have a partner in the horse instead of selling shares in him, so we bought into him, because he is a Gr.1-winning horse out of a Danehill mare who in turn is out of a Vain mare who has produced Keltrice.

  “He has Gr.1 winners in his first three dams and it’s a beautiful pedigree, particularly when you think it goes directly back to Toltrice. Unfortunately EI took the bat to us a bit in his first season but he’s still been receiving more than a 100 mares each year and he is producing lovely types.”

  As a “hands on” stud manager Scott says he remains very much in favour of the natural way of stallions serving their mare:. “I think the push for artificial insemination is a worry. I don’t know how you could control the use of artificial insemination if it did come into operation. In fact I think it could well signal the death knell of little farms because there will be virtually no restriction on the popular horses standing on the big studs. On that basis I don’t think it is the right direction for the industry to be heading unless those involved can work out some way of controlling numbers. We have enough trouble now finding the numbers without that happening.”

  Scott says he is concerned about the problems confronting the smaller farms and for that reason he is not encouraging Harry, Angus or Charlie to follow the traditional family pathway into Eureka: “It’s obvious that it is becoming increasingly difficult to compete against the big boys. They have so much money; they are having the pick of the mares; and they are having the opportunity to have the pick of the stallions. To be a commercial middle of the road operation is even tougher because the big farms can offer deals that studs like ours can’t match because we need the cash flow to keep the place running. Those big studs are, in a way, becoming like bankers.

  “Although we have three boys I am not enticing them to come home and take over the stud because I feel our situation is fragile. At the same time we can still acquire reasonable quality mares, and hopefully Red Dazzler will make the grade.  If he becomes a good sire the opportunity will be there to compete with the big boys to a degree. We are also favoured by the fact that Queensland racing is very strong. There is a lot of prizemoney specifically designated for Queensland-bred horses, and we are probably now racing more horses than we ever have.

  “We’ve got some valuable older mares like Kate Be Good, the dam of Another Warrior and Real Saga’s dam Windy Kate, and Madam Curie, the dam of Pure Energy and Segments, and we are trying to race their daughters and keep them on as broodmares. There are also some other families we’ve had and been developing over a long time.

  “We had Showsay, who was the dam of Precious Pearl, who produced Air’s Precious as well as the multiple stakes winner Diamondsondinside; and Air’s Precious is the dam of Express Air so that family now goes back four generations at Eureka. Through this continuing commitment we feel we are showing our faith in the industry in Queensland and our confidence in the incentive schemes that have been put into place. Over the years we’ve sold yearlings in Cairns, Townsville, Rockhampton, Nambour, Caloundra, Roma, Brisbane and the Gold Coast as well as Tamworth. We’ve also sold in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.

  “I’ve taken horses away to sell at all those venues to try and promote our product, and to sell the horses you are breeding - as well as supporting the little companies that are selling them. We have produced a lot of winners for an enterprise that is not a big-producing farm. I suppose our winner-to-runner ratio is about 80 per cent, and by spreading the horses around, more people come to know about that . . . and that makes the effort worthwhile.”

  Although the going has not always easy Scott certainly does not suffer any heart-burn about his teenage decision to become a part of the family’s business: “I enjoy running the stud and doing what I do,” he said.  “It makes for a great lifestyle, and you meet a lot of tremendous people. Success comes and success goes but we just keep battling away. There aren’t too many of the old fashioned family owned and run commercial thoroughbred studs remaining in Australia, and it’s what we make our money out of - that’s what we’ve dedicated our life to do. You don’t keep doing it if you don’t enjoy it - and you can’t keep doing it, if your not making some money. It’s as simple as that.”

Tags: Bluebloods, Eureka Stud
Permalink| Aug 16, 2010

Comments are closed.