A former jockey, trainer and exercise rider, Amanda Roxborough is the driving force behind Kylar Productions, a company that provides numerous production services including the “Race Day Experience,” which gives horse owners the opportunity to document a special event.
Roxborough has also teamed up with with fellow former jockey, Francine Villeneuve, to create Sport of Queens (www.sportofqueensracing.com), a racing syndicate that offers aspiring thoroughbred owners a lost-cost opportunity to get into the game.
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“Chief Seattle made a big impression on me as soon as came into our barn as a 2-year-old in 1999. He was by the great Seattle Slew and was a big, black beauty. I loved riding him and he just had an amazing presence about him. It wasn't just his raw talent and the fact that he was outworking everything in the barn for fun - it was his character and attitude that I enjoyed the most. He debuted at Saratoga and won by 9 3/4 lengths, only one-fifth off the track record time.
After finishing fourth, beaten 1 1/4 lengths, in the Futurity Stakes (gr. 1), he ran second in the Champagne Stakes (gr. 1) and then was runner-up in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (gr. 1) to subsequent champion 2-year-old male Anees. Bred in Kentucky by Atwood Richards, Chief Seattle was produced from the stakes winning Icecapade mare Skatingonthinice, who is a half-sister to the dam of grade 1 winner and successful young sire War Front.
Unfortunately, he was sold in the winter following the Breeders’ Cup. Chief Seattle was bought privately by the Maktoum family’s Godolphin and sent to Dubai to prepare for the 2000 Kentucky Derby. I was disappointed that they decided to sell him, as I was looking forward to going on the Derby trail with him and was heartbroken to lose my buddy.
Chief Seattle began his stallion career at Spendthrift Farm in Lexington, Kentucky for a fee of $10,000. He later stood at Vinery in New York. Chief Seattle has sired 27 stakes horses and the earners of more than $16 million.
Three of his 10 stakes winners were champions including Shillelagh Slew, who was Canada’s champion 3-year-old male of 2006. It was fun to watch his offspring become a champion in my old stomping grounds, Woodbine! Chief Seattle also sired California grade 2 winners Bold Chiefton and Seafree. He later was in Indiana at Lake Shore Farms where sadly he died in October 2011. They found him in his paddock one morning and never disclosed how he passed.
When I think of him I think of sheer talent. He was the most gifted equine athlete I have ever ridden. And I did manage to get to the Kentucky Derby with two others after him, Wheelaway and Friends Lake, but ‘Chief’ was surely a special one!”
By Amanda Roxborough, for Ontario Racing
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