Maximum Security vindicates Jane Lyon's $1.85m purchase of rags-to-riches dam

Her story is the very essence of racing and breeding, a surge and plunge of ups and downs through a saga that began in the lowest rungs of the auction ring only to soar to the peak of triumph in the richest horse race in history.

The 13-year-old mare Lil Indy, sold for $2,200 as a yearling and for only $11,000 in 2018, now claims a special place in history as the dam of Maximum Security, winner of the $20 million Saudi Cup at King Abudulaziz Racecourse in Riyadh on Saturday.

A solidly-made chestnut with an elongated star, Lil Indy was blithely grazing at Jane Lyon’s Summer Wind Farm in Kentucky, more than 7,000 miles away from where Maximum Security had to summon all his courage in a long stretch drive to win the $10 million winner’s share of the Saudi Cup.

Cheers erupted during an informal watch party at Lyon’s house when the four-year-old colt turned back champion American mare Midnight Bisou by three quarters of a length.

"I don’t feel quite so foolish now for paying $1.85 million for a mare that had previously only cost $11,000,” Lyon declared, laughing while recalling how she had to bid boldly, following recommendations from advisers, to secure Lil Indy at last year's Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale.

Jane Lyon, pictured with jockey Drayden Van Dyke, has been having a fine runCredit: Benoit Photo

Yet the celebration was just beginning at Summer Wind. Within minutes of Maximum Security passing the post, Lyon’s homebred Tapit mare Secret Sigh went into labour with her first foal and shortly thereafter produced a stunning Frankel filly marked with a blaze and four stockings.

With unraced five-year-old Secret Sigh a daughter of Grade 2 winner India, the newborn filly is a three-parts sister to Mozu Ascot, the son of Frankel bred by Summer Wind who has become the leading earner for his extraordinary sire by winning Grade 1 events on dirt and turf in Japan and banking over $3.73m.

On the following day, a three-parts brother to Summer Wind-bred multiple Grade 1 winner and Saudi Cup entrant McKinzie was delivered at the farm. The newborn son of Street Sense is out of McKinzie’s half sister Malibu Model, by Malibu Moon.

For a farm with 38 mares on its roster, the weekend was one of massive global achievement as well as new beginnings that bode well for a shining future.

Lyon and Summer Wind manager Bobby Spalding reflected on how it took determination and resolve for Lil Indy to come to reside with them.

"Of all the mares we looked at [during the November sales], she was the one I wanted the most," said Spalding, citing the mare’s robust yet medium-sized physique as well as Maximum Security’s superior ability as key factors.

Led into the Keeneland ring as hip 13, Lil Indy drew moderate bidding at first, with Lyon thinking she perhaps might get a "bargain", as she said at the time.

By the A.P. Indy stallion Anasheed, Lil Indy is a half-sister to multiple Grade 1 winner and sire Flat Out.

But pressed by owner and breeder Larry Best, Lyon wound up paying more than she had thought she would have to for the Florida-bred mare who had been bought by South Korea’s Triple Crown for $11,000 the previous year at Keeneland and then exported.

Lil Indy was returned from Korea to America when acquired privately by SF Bloodstock between Maximum Security’s 2019 Florida Derby victory and his controversial disqualification after finishing first in the Kentucky Derby.

"I feel a touch vindicated,” Lyon said after the Saudi Cup, "because I kept thinking after I bought that mare, 'Gee, what must people think when I’m the one who paid $1.85 million for an $11,000 mare?’

"The Saudi Cup is validation that Maximum Security is the horse people thought he was. And that obviously gives Lil Indy a lot more credibility as a broodmare," she said.

In addition to Summer Wind and Coolmore - which is racing Maximum Security in partnership with breeders Gary and Mary West and plans to stand the colt at Ashford Stud in Kentucky - another big winner in the wake of Maximum Security’s Saudi Cup victory is Taylor Made Sales.

Frank Taylor confirmed that Taylor Made was able to purchase Maximum Security’s now yearling full-sister after she was listed as a $190,000 RNA while offered as a weanling at the Keeneland
November sale.

Just like Lil Indy, the filly will benefit from Maximum Security being crowned America’s champion three-year-old male and receiving the Eclipse Award in January and then capturing the unprecedented Saudi Cup prize a month later.

"She is a very nice filly and looks just like her brother," said Taylor, who indicated that the daughter of New Year’s Day foaled in Korea had been bought for the Bloodstock Investments group affiliated with Taylor Made. Plans currently call for the filly to be offered later this year at auction.

"We would sell privately if the number was right,” Taylor said.

Meanwhile, Lyon is looking forward to Lil Indy producing a foal by Quality Road in mid-April and has booked the mare back to Curlin.

Speaking about her newborn foals, she described Malibu Model’s son as “a magnificent colt", adding that she purchased the mare - who had been sold by Summer Wind as a $285,000 yearling - for $750,000 at Keeneland in 2018 in hopes of producing another McKinzie.

Malibu Model was in foal to Curlin at the time and delivered a now yearling filly.

Secret Sigh with her newborn Frankel filly foalCredit: Michele MacDonald

As for the Frankel filly out of Secret Sigh, Lyon said she is a dream come true.

After falling in love with Frankel when inspecting the stallion at Juddmonte’s Banstead Manor Stud, Lyon sent India to him and was smitten with her subsequent colt who became Mozu Ascot, even though he was a $275,000 RNA at the 2015 Keeneland September Yearling Sale because he was on the small side and had "a little bit of sesamoiditis".

When Juddmonte representatives asked if she would like to send India back to Frankel, Lyon thought the mare was getting too old to make the trip and suggested Secret Sigh instead, who was accepted.

"She’s a beautiful mare," Lyon said. "While she was still in Europe, they fetal sexed her and they told me she was having a filly. And I've been thinking of nothing else since that day until the filly was born on Saturday.

"She's everything I could have ever hoped she would be, and I cannot wait to watch her grow and see what she can become."

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