Generation Next: Breakers, consignors, and stallions under saddle with Lance Forbes

Cover image supplied

Kiwi expat Lance Forbes learned to ride as a child in the show world, taught by his mother Sheryl Forbes. Thoroughbreds were always on his periphery though, as his father Graeme Forbes, mother, and grandfather all held training licenses throughout his childhood. His earliest memories of the breed come from within the round pen.

“My grandad was a dairy farmer, but he was also an amateur jockey, and he used to train a few jumpers around that,” said Forbes. “My first memory of thoroughbreds was breaking in a horse with him, one called Enjoyit. I’m pretty sure that was my first time riding a thoroughbred.”

The 2007-born gelding Enjoyit (NZ) (One Cool Cat {USA}) ended his career with two wins to his name, but he is best remembered in Forbes’s life as his first brush with horses bred by Sir Patrick and Lady Hogan. As a young teenager, he would spend his school holidays at Cambridge Stud helping out wherever he could, before Bruce Harvey approached him with an exciting offer.

“I was working the Ready to Run sales just while my exams were going on, and then I got offered a job by him,” Forbes recalled. The offer involved jumping on a plane to Hong Kong and working the sales. “I had a great opportunity to go to Hong Kong at an early age and to do a bit of travel, and he (Harvey) was a great boss.”

Forbes stayed three and a half years with Harvey, who owns Ascot Farm with wife Maureen, soaking in the international atmosphere and furthering skills acquired at Cambridge. The Harveys offered yearlings and 2-year-olds at the sales at home in New Zealand as well, but their main focus was the bustling Hong Kong breeze-up sales.

Forbes’ brother Mark operates the successful breaking and trading business Kiltannon Stables in Cambridge, and Forbes worked alongside him for two years after his Hong Kong stint.

“It was a big part of my life, breaking-in,” he said. “My brother started his business, so I went and helped him out for two years. We broke in about 120 horses a year. That was a really good learning curve in my life.”

Scholarship student

The yearling barn beckoned Forbes back, and he took up the mantle of yearling manager at Cambridge Stud, where he was awarded the Sunline Trust Management Scholarship by the New Zealand Thoroughbred Breeders Association. Between the yearling seasons, Forbes headed first to England, where he worked for Cheveley Park Stud, home at the time to the influential Pivotal (GB) and Medicean (GB), before spending three weeks with Goffs UK, where he experienced the Aintree and National Hunt sales.

“Then I went to Coolmore (in) Ireland, where I was lucky enough to work with Galileo, who was around at the time,” Forbes said. “They were really good at Coolmore, they put you everywhere.”

Gallery: Lance Forbes in the Northern Hemisphere during the Sunline Trust Management Scholarship

The scholarship finished off Stateside at Taylor Made Farm, the residence of US Hall of Fame Thoroughbred California Chrome (USA) and Northern Afleet (USA) as well as being one of the country's leading thoroughbred consignors - as Forbes swiftly learned, everything is bigger in America.

“It's a big, family-owned business on a mega scale,” said Forbes. “And they're just lovely, welcoming people. It's pretty spectacular the way they function. When I was there, we sold 340 horses at the Keeneland sales consigned under the Taylor Made name.

“They're great people and awesome to learn from. All the farms were super - it was a great learning experience to have the Sunline scholarship. It's a great opportunity for young people in New Zealand.”

Headed to the Hunter

After a second yearling season with Cambridge Stud, Forbes turned his attention across the Tasman. In 2018, he landed in the Hunter Valley, where he quickly took the job as yearling manager for the prestigious Yarraman Park Stud. He has been there ever since, overseeing the preparations of Group 2 winners Kristilli (Hellbent) and Hell Hath No Fury (Hellbent), Rosemont Stud’s freshman stallion Doull, and promising juvenile Hi Barbie (I Am Invincible).

One yearling that has had a special place in Forbes’s heart is now six, a winner of over $3.6 million in prizemoney, and has taken out a Magic Millions feature race every January for the last three years.

“One of my all-time favourites is King Of Sparta,” Forbes said. “I’ve been with him his whole life, pretty much, from being a foal to being a 6-year-old. He just had the best attitude and he comes back here (now) to spell, and I ride him in pre-training in the winter now too.”

King Of Sparta (I Am Invincible) was born in the spring of Forbes's first year in the Valley. He would grow up to be a $700,000 purchase for China Horse Club, Newgate Bloodstock, and Starlight Racing at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale almost five years ago, and he has more than rewarded that investment, both for his owners and his champion sire.

He isn’t the only good investment that Forbes throws a saddle on, as a key part of the pre-season warm-up for resident rising star Hellbent is ridden work as well.

“He (Hellbent) gets six weeks pretraining under saddle before the season to get him fit,” Forbes shared. “He loves it too. It's great for his mind and a great way to get him fit.”

Yarraman Park’s expansive property features a 1000-metre grass track and an additional hill gallop, although Forbes can forgive anyone not noticing it circling several lush paddocks by the stud’s front gate.

In the words of Forbes, the stud is a “big farm and a small farm” at the same time. Outside of the sales season, he rotates around the farm, holding foals for their first trims before holding the stallion chain in the covering shed. As the winter creeps in, he prepares a small batch of weanlings for the ring.

“Weanlings are easy, they learn quickly and they’re much smaller,” he joked.

Always learning

Forbes is happy to support the growing educational offerings from the Hunter Thoroughbred Breeders Association and Thoroughbred Breeders Australia. The stud supports employees through short courses and further education, which is an important contributor to keeping top workers in the industry.

“We have a Fast Track student every year, at least,” he said. “We’ve had some great people come through that program - Lachlan Pethica was one of the first that came to us, in the first year of the program, and he went on to do the Godolphin Flying Start.

“We've had some great success with that course. It’s great what they (TBA and HTBA) are doing for the industry. We need new people coming through, and (the courses) are a great way to get a stepping stone into breeding.”

Forbes is committed to continually learning himself, and he’s thankful for the guidance he continues to receive from the Mitchell family.

“I never want to stop learning in this industry, and I cover as many bases as I can in the thoroughbred industry,” he said.

“They (the Mitchells) are fantastic, they've treated me like family from the day I arrived. And they've taught me so much, in life skills as well as horses.”

That drive to continually self-improve is, in his belief, integral for anyone wanting to enter and advance up through the thoroughbred world. Chief above all, of course, is a passion for the animal.

“And if you don't mind a bit of hard work,” Forbes added, “it's a perfect place to be!”