150 years after his birth, Tesio still ranks as racing's greatest all-rounder

Born in Turin 150 years ago on Thursday, Federico Tesio still ranks as the greatest all-round horseman in the history of thoroughbred racing and breeding.

The 'Wizard of Dormello', as he came to be known, founded his stud on the site of a former silkworm farm in 1898. That property, on the banks of Lake Maggiore in northern Italy, became the base for a breeding operation that dominated the national scene for well over half a century, and for much of that time was recognised as one of the foremost studs in the whole of Europe.

Tesio was contemporary with other great breeders, such as Marcel Boussac in France and the 17th Earl of Derby and HH Aga Khan III in England, but while those titans had the benefit of gifted advisers and professional horsemen to aid them, the Italian achieved all his successes as a one-man band.

He employed no agents, no advisers, no managers. He, and he alone, selected the fillies and mares for his stud, and he devised every mating for them. He made all his own decisions, from first to last, as he was also his own trainer. He mastered every aspect of the business, his phenomenal results attained by dint of unparalleled judgement, expertise and flair.

Laying down foundations

Tesio recognised early that he would need to acquire stock from sales in England if he was to establish a successful operation in Italy, and he became a frequent visitor to Tattersalls, collecting fillies and mares, often at knockdown prices, for the paddocks at Dormello.

On his trip to the December Sales in 1905 he dug quite deep to lay out 600gns for the ten-year-old American-bred mare Jiffy, a former winner of the Ebor Handicap. The mare was carrying a Bay Ronald filly, Fidia, who would supply her breeder-owner-trainer with his first prestige triumph, notching a win in the 1909 Gran Premio di Milano, Italy’s most important open-age event.

A previous purchase, for only 200gns at the 1904 December Sales, was Jenny Hampton, who founded a fruitful family at Dormello, the most significant of her brood being Guido Reni, who in 1911 became the first of 20 Derby Italiano winners bred, owned and trained by Tesio. (The final tally of his successes as breeder in that Classic became 22, two scoring after his death.)

Factfile

Born Turin, January 17, 1869

Stud Razza Dormello (later Razza Dormello-Olgiata) founded 1898

First Italian Derby winner Guido Reni (1911)

Unbeaten champions Ribot (16 races), Nearco (14 races), Braque (12 races), Cavaliere D'Arpino (5 races)

Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Ribot (1955, 1956)

King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes winner Ribot (1956)

Grand Prix de Paris winner Nearco (1938)

Coronation Cup winner Apelle (1928)

Ascot Gold Cup winner Botticelli (1955)

Goodwood Cup winner Tenerani (1948)

Italian 2,000 Guineas, Derby & St Leger winners Niccolo Dell'Arca (1941), Botticelli (1954)

Italian Derby & St Leger winners Michelangelo (1921), Bellini (1940), Tenerani (1947), Daumier (1951), Braque (1957)

Quadruple Italian Classic winner Jacopa Del Sellaio (all except St Leger 1932)

Most notable wins in Italy 22 in Derby, 11 in Oaks, 18 in St Leger, 22 in Gran Premio di Milano

Grand Prix de Paris runner-up Donatello (1937)

Died Milan, May 1, 1954, aged 85

Compiled by John Randall

The first ten of those Derby wins came in the 13 seasons up to 1923, by which time Tesio decided that he must test his stock in more demanding environments. He took Scopas to Germany for a victory in the 1924 Grosser Preis von Baden, and in the following year Apelle notched a win in the Criterium de Maisons-Laffitte.

In 1926 he went back to France with Apelle and Cranach for the Grand Prix de Paris, then regarded as Europe’s foremost international contest for three-year-olds. The pair finished unplaced, but the main objective of the trip, to get one or both of them sold, was realised. Apelle found a buyer, and the funds he brought in helped to ensure that Tesio could maintain his dominance in Italy.

Increasing the quality

But with his sights set on long-term top-level international competition, Tesio realised that he would have to patronise Europe’s best stallions, most of whom were based in England and France. And that would inevitably be a costly exercise.

Seven of his Derby winners had been by the leading Italian sire Signorino, and Havresac, another home-based horse, would deliver him champions in Cavaliere D’Arpino and Nogara, but his preference was for foreign sires when he could afford it.

What Tesio could afford changed significantly in the early 1930s, when he entered into partnership with the Marchese Mario Incisa della Rocchetta. His runners thereafter appeared on racecards as the property of Tesio-Incisa, and the stud book followed suit over the registration of his foals.

Needless to say, Incisa’s role was just to provide funds. He played no part in the making of any decisions about the horses of whom he was half-owner. But he recognised that when in partnership with a genius, it would be folly to query his actions. His investment delivered him a share in a lot of glory, if not actual financial profit, and the association ended only on Tesio’s death in 1954.

The first great successes for the partnership came from Donatello, whose Epsom Classic-winning sire Blenheim had become affordable under the new arrangement. Donatello won all his starts in Italy, including the Derby, the Gran Premio di Milano and the Gran Premio d’Italia, and but for a poor ride would have retained his unbeaten record in the Grand Prix de Paris.

However, the Longchamp performance was sufficiently impressive to attract a lucrative offer, and Tesio was happy to let the colt go. He had bought Donatello’s grand-dam, Duccia di Buoninsegna, as a yearling in England for only 210gns, she had bred him two dual Classic winners, one of whom had now delivered him a champion – and Edward Esmond’s cheque for £47,500.

Donatello proceeded to make a significant mark as a sire in England, his progeny including two outstanding performers in Alycidon and Crepello, and they in turn found success as champion sires.

Enter Nearco

Nearco was born a year after Donatello, and there were marked similarities over their careers. Both were dominant performers, unbeaten in Italy, but Nearco went one better than his former stable companion by retaining his undefeated record in the Grand Prix de Paris, his victims including the winners of the Epsom (Bois Roussel) and Chantilly (Cillas) Derbys.

Tesio had bought Nearco’s grand-dam Catnip at the 1915 December Sales in Newmarket for only 75gns, and she had bred him Nogara, who won both Italian mile Classics in 1931. Her breeder’s intended mating for her in 1934 was with Fairway, but he could not obtain a nomination and had to settle instead for Fairway’s brother Pharos.

Nearco may not have been the foal Tesio wanted, but the re-routing of Nogara to Pharos had enormous consequences, for the breed as well as for the breeder. Within days of the colt’s victory at Longchamp, Tesio sold him for £60,000 to Martin Benson, and as events unfolded over the years that followed, it became clear that Nearco was the most important horse imported to England since the Godolphin Arabian.

Branches of Nearco’s sire line through Nasrullah and Nearctic continue to thrive famously 80 years after that epoch-making deal.

Tesio was never a conventional breeder, but he was consistent in his practice. He did not believe that families thrived in perpetuity, and when they had evidently peaked, he lost interest in them. Nearco had a long, highly successful career at stud in Newmarket, but his breeder could not care less. He only ever used the horse once, sending him a mare with a dodgy foaling record, and she duly proved barren.

The breeder's masterpiece

Tesio’s name rings a bell for many for his most famous quote: “The Thoroughbred exists because its selection has depended, not on experts, technicians or zoologists, but on a piece of wood: the winning post of the Epsom Derby. If you base your criteria on anything else, you will get something else, not the Thoroughbred.”

The assertion does not bear close scrutiny, and would never have been granted credibility if it had not been made by such an eminent breeder. Tesio always liked to use Derby winners on his mares, but they were rarely major contributors to the success of his breeding programme. In some respects he seemed an eccentric, his keen patronage of Airborne an obvious example. Sometimes conventional breeders knew better.

World War II limited Tesio’s access to many major stallions and forced him to use some of his own horses, which he ordinarily would not have done. But one of them, Bellini – his 15th Derby victor – was responsible for Tenerani, a Triple Crown winner at home who made visits to England for victories in the 1948 Queen Elizabeth Stakes and Goodwood Cup.

Tenerani was no oil painting, but he was a powerful galloper who excelled over long distances. He stood at Dormello for three seasons, but Tesio then sent him on lease to England’s National Stud, and when that operation offered £20,000 to buy him outright a deal was swiftly concluded.

Tenerani was too plain and too much of a stayer to impress Tesio as a likely major sire, so he would not use him on any of his most distinguished mares. But he did send him Romanella, who had been a speedy two-year-old and had failed to train on, and that mating resulted in Ribot, who would come to be regarded as Tesio’s masterpiece.

Ribot: Tesio did not live long enough to see his magnum opus raceCredit: Archives APRH

Tesio’s assessment of Tenerani’s stud prospects turned out to be accurate; his innings as a sire delivered only one consequential outcome. But that solitary star was Ribot, whose three-season career produced 16 wins from as many starts, including the King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes and two editions of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.

Entries for the Italian Classics had to be made at the yearling stage, when Ribot seemed small and insignificant, so Tesio opted not to nominate him. The maestro reportedly saw more promise in the colt in his early training at two, but he died, aged 85, when Ribot’s debut was still two months in the future.

Missing Italy’s classics hardly mattered to Ribot, whose sky-high reputation rested on his Ascot and Longchamp displays, the second Arc, in 1956, impressing many observers as one of the performances of the century.

Tesio evidently went to his grave still believing that Ribot’s great-grandsire Cavaliere d’Arpino – also unbeaten, but sadly unsound – had been the best horse he had bred. He would surely have changed his mind, had he lived to see Ribot in his pomp at Longchamp. And if past form was anything to go by, he would have recognised a line that had peaked and was thus of no further interest to him.

Ribot became an important sire on both sides of the Atlantic and headed the Anglo/Irish list on three occasions. His male line has faded since his great-grandson Alleged emulated him with a pair of Arc victories in the late 1970s, but he remains a factor in many pedigrees without featuring to the degree established by the ubiquitous Nearco.

Tesio wrote books about his half-century as a breeder, and numerous publications have dealt in depth with his extraordinary achievements, but it is no easy matter to explain the secrets of his success beyond the observation that he was supremely gifted in every aspect of the art.

Brigadier Gerard’s breeder, John Hislop, put things neatly: “When those of my generation come to be asked by their grandchildren ‘Who was the greatest breeder, the outstanding sire, the best racehorse of your time?’ the answer will probably be ‘Tesio, Nearco, Ribot.’”

Read more by Tony Morris...

Specious honours being awarded as Pattern grows to record size

The horse whose father was also her brother and other tales of incest

Tales from Tattersalls: Vaguely Noble represented promise rather than celebrity