The Optimist - Sir Patrick Hogan

[Ohokaman]

The Sir Patrick Hogan genius played its part

in the breeding of Ka Ying Rising….

 

by Brian de Lore
Published 20^th January 2026

As the world’s number one sprinter prepares to equal Silent Witness’s record-breaking streak of 17 consecutive wins at Sha Tin in Sunday week’s Group One Centenary Sprint Cup, it is perhaps fitting to acknowledge a lesser-known but important aspect of the champion’s pedigree.

Trainer-breeder Fraser Auret from Marton was honoured as ‘Small Breeder of the Year’ at last July’s National Breeding Awards, one of four trophies he took home from the Cambridge event, which also included Broodmare of the Year for the dam, Missy Moo (Per Incanto).

Ka Ying Rising is also a feather in the cap of Windsor Park Stud’s Shamexpress and Little Avondale’s Per Incanto, as the sire and dam’s sire, respectively, but the late Sir Patrick Hogan did something quite extraordinary in the late 1960s that put the foundation stone in place for the emergence of Ka Ying Rising decades later.

As a young man in his late twenties, Patrick was hellbent on building a quality band of broodmares and kept alert in his quest to find a good mare at the right price. He had identified Le Filou’s impending importance as a broodmare sire and had developed a close association with Jack Macky, who stood Le Filou at Pirongia Stud.

Then, one day, Patrick became aware of a tragedy that occurred at Wanganui Racecourse in early February of 1968. Mr C.H. Trillo had just seen his good four-year-old horse Avro win the Wanganui Cup, but while making his way down a staircase to the presentation in the birdcage, he collapsed and died from a heart attack. Mr Trillo had bred Avro (Stunning) with the first mating of his Le Filou mare, False Credit.

 

 

At 28, Patrick constantly read the Stud Book; he had become familiar with False Credit, noting she had produced only three foals, although a rising 12-year-old. Mr Trillo hadn’t bred the Le Filou mare every season, and having failed to get her in foal from her 1967 mating, he couldn’t help but wonder what plans the widow Trillo might have for False Credit.

Patrick waited a month or two, and then phoned Mrs Trillo to see whether she would sell False Credit and her two-year-old daughter, Vickyjoy. The answer came down the line as a definite ‘no’ and a second ‘no’ when Patrick attempted to lease the mare and daughter on a foal-share arrangement. When he inquired what Mrs Trillo intended to do with the mare and filly, the perplexing response to Patrick came back, as “they would stay in their paddock.”

Patrick thought about it for a while and decided he wouldn’t give up and would now drive to Wanganui to meet Mrs Trillo. He knocked on her door, got her attention, and told her he didn’t wish to upset her in any way, but that he had a keen interest in the pedigrees of False Credit and her daughter. He spoke to Mrs Trillo with the utmost eloquence and soon received an invitation to view the mare and filly in the paddock with the offer of a cup of tea afterwards.

Mrs Trillo warmed to the young, charismatic Patrick, and by the time he left her house, she had agreed to lease False Credit on a foal-share arrangement and sell him her daughter, Vickyjoy, for $5000.

His decision to purchase Vickyjoy for a not-so-inconsequential amount of money for those days may have raised some eyebrows, as the filly had raced six times in the first half of her two-year-old season for a best finish of fourth, earning $40 in prizemoney. She had also finished last in her last three starts and physically lacked presence and size.

 

When the horse float arrived at Fencourt Stud with the mare and filly, Tom and Patrick’s brother, John, laughed their heads off when Vickyjoy came off the float ramp – the rising three-year-old standing barely 15.1 hands, not in the best condition, and wobbly from grass staggers. Patrick later admitted that he suffered a little self-doubt that day, but years later would have the last laugh.

The older brother, John, and Patrick didn’t agree on very much when it came to horses. They kept separate ownership at Fencourt Stud – this was eight years before the purchase of Sir Tristram and nine years before Patrick’s founding of Cambridge Stud.

The irony of False Credit and Vickyjoy arriving at Fencourt came in the favourable impression created by False Credit – a good-looking, roomy mare with good scope and potential. Yet, the daughter of Le Filou would produce only two further live foals in the nine years at stud under the lease arrangement.

 

Only one of the two, a filly by Hermes, made the yearling sales, in 1972, fetching $6750, but failing to win for her owner in Australia.

Patrick, mocked by Tom and John Hogan, had the last laugh

The unlikely gem was the diminutive Vickyjoy, a racecourse failure, retired to stud as a three-year-old in the spring of 1968, to the bemusement of Tom and John Hogan. Her stud career also started poorly when her first colt foal by Agricola died.

But in the next 13 seasons, Vickyjoy produced 11 foals, the third of which, Taiona (Sovereign Edition), would become the superstar of Patrick’s broodmare band and eventually the fourth dam of Ka Ying Rising. Taiona secured Patrick’s top-billing at sale time on numerous occasions and was twice Broodmare of the Year.

The Vickyjoy experience led Patrick to believe there were other opportunities with foal-sharing deals. From then on, he pursued the owners of quality mares and slowly built up his broodmare band.

Even in those early days as a young man around 30, trying to get ahead, he set himself huge goals, with a high standard of presentation for his horses and himself, working long and hard to achieve the best results. He consistently identified the quality families in the Stud Book and sought opportunities.

The full Patrick Hogan story and the biographical history of others who have shaped the New Zealand Thoroughbred over the past 150 years can be read in a new 25-chapter coffee table book called The Horsemakers, available from www.thehorsemakers.com  from the 2nd February, or earlier at Sunday and Monday’s 100th National Yearling Sale at Karaka.

 

 

The sequel to the Patrick Hogan adventure with Vickyjoy and then Taiona is that he continued to breed the family for 30 years. In the spring of 1982, when Gurner’s Lane (Sir Tristram-Taiona) won the Melbourne Cup, his full sister, Her Dynasty, was foaled at Cambridge Stud. Ka Ying Rising’s granddam, Royal Rhythm (Rhythm-Her Dynasty), would be foaled at the Stud another 16 years later in 1998.

Patrick offered Royal Rhythm as a yearling at the Millennium Premier Yearling Sale at Karaka in 2000 – Lot 415 bought by David Ellis and John Rennie for $57,500. They raced her eight times, which produced only one third-place finish.

Then they bred her for nine years, from which she produced seven colts, before selling her as a 13-year-old in-foal to King’s Chapel for $1000 at the National Broodmare and Mixed Bloodstock Sale in May 2011, bought by G.J. Morgan.
 When the King’s Chapel colt arrived, went into training, and couldn’t go fast enough to run out of sight on a moonless night, it meant the mare had produced eight colts, six of which raced, for no winners.

Imagine buying the granddam of the world’s best sprinter for $1000?

But Mr Morgan had kept the faith; he sent Royal Rhythm to Per Incanto, and in 2012, she produced the filly, later to be named Missy Moo.

Missy Moo was the only filly from Royal Rhythm and the only winner, and the last of the nine foals she produced, and Royal Rhythm died aged 16 before Missy Moo won the first of her five race wins.

The late Sir Patrick Hogan would love to have claimed the credit for Ka Ying Rising, but as strong as the Vickyjoy-Taiona family blood proved in his day, the family revival and credit for Ka Ying Rising’s world-class performances should be shared by the Shamexpress over Per Incanto cross – two gems amongst today’s annually depleting New Zealand stallion ranks.

The breeding of a world champion sprinting racehorse in New Zealand, on pastures historically suited to producing high-quality middle-distance and staying-type horses, remains an unsolved mystery.
Stranger things have happened at sea, but not on land.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[bloke]

What a great broodmare Taiona was. She is also the fourth Dam of Mister Brightside

[We're Doomed]

A promotion for his new book. Good on him though, we don't get many Racing books these days.

[scooby3051]

Sir Patrick was an absolute legend of our industry, spent many a fun evening with him a super funny guy, RIP Sir Patrick.

[Breeder]

I have just received my copy of Brian's book. A high quality book production and looking through the content he has covered all the important people involved in the history of the industry. Obviously I have not read it,yet, but I do not think I will be disappointed in the purchase.

[Breeder]

I read the chapter on Gary Chitick earlier. Great reading and that chapter alone made purchase worthwhile. I'm sure other chapters will be just as good (skim read bits of them) so I recoomend the book to those interested in the history / development of the industry as well the "characters" involved.