Arrowfield mourning the death of stalwart stallion Not A Single Doubt

John Messara and Arrowfield Stud were mourning the loss of Not A Single Doubt, the ‘unassuming’ sire who rose from the periphery of the Australian stallion ranks to become one of the most formidable and sought after producers of elite-level winners in the country.

A stallion who will be widely considered as one of the best Australia has produced never to win a champion sire premiership, Not A Single Doubt succumbed at the age of 20 to the ongoing ramifications of a progressive lung disease, an illness which saw him retired from stud duty in 2020. He was euthanised at Arrowfield’s Scone property yesterday morning.

“He’ll leave his mark,” Arrowfield principal John Messara told ANZ Bloodstock News. “He was a great soldier for us. He started neatly and he finished grandiociously.

“He threw fillies and colts and they were always genuine animals and, in the end, he had a sparkling career when you analyse the stats.

“There’s nobody who could say a bad thing about him. He was unassuming and well-loved around the farm, but boy he delivered a punch.”

A talented racehorse, the Arrowfield-bred Not A Single Doubt completed his rise to the top of a prolific stud career from a position of relative obscurity, having retired to the roster as the winner of just two Listed races in a ten-start career that yielded four wins.

Initially trained by Graeme Rogerson, he won his debut at Rosehill by five lengths before his first Listed success came as a pre-Christmas juvenile in the Canonbury Stakes at Randwick. He added his second stakes success under the guidance of Tony Vasil as a three-year-old when winning the Zeditave Stakes at Caulfield in January 2005.

A trip to New Zealand for the Railway Stakes at Ellerslie on New Year’s Day in 2005 saw him finish seventh, while in his other attempts at the elite-level he finished sixth in the CF Orr Stakes and ninth in his final track appearance in the Newmarket Handicap at Flemington in March of that year.

Retired to stand for an opening fee of A$13,750 (all fees inc GST), Messara recalled how he always had faith in the son of Arrowfield’s champion sire Redoute’s Choice becoming a success at stud, despite his perceived lesser track credentials,although his stallion career began in more modest fashion in comparison to the dizzying heights he reached towards the end of his glittering career at stud.

“He was only a Listed winner, but in our minds he was a Group 1 winner in waiting,” Messara said. “He was a horse that didn’t like the wet and he was a horse that, on a couple of occasions when he was ready to win at the highest level, struck wet tracks.

“He had a change of trainers, which was a bit disturbing for his programme at the time. So he didn’t have everything go his own way when he was racing, but he did show some flashes of brilliance.

“He certainly had a stallion’s pedigree, but underneath it all we knew he had a lot of talent so we took the risk and stood him.”

A compact but ‘not a particularly elegant’ horse, emblazoned with a striking white stripe down his face, Not A Single Doubt’s stud career did not begin with the same panache as that of his track career, which saw him unbeaten from his first three outings.

Not A Single Doubt stood his first six seasons at A$13,750. His first crop of two-year-olds yielded two stakes placegetters in New Zealand and 13 winners in Australia.

It was not until the backend of the season for his first three-year-olds that Not A Single Doubt would land a maiden stakes winner, the Peter Moody-trained Doubtful Jack, who won the VRC Winter Championships in July, and became his first Group winner when as an early-season four-year-old he won the Bobbie Lewis Quality at Flemington.

Not A Single Doubt: 'He was unassuming and well-loved around the farm, but boy he delivered a punch.'

In the sales ring, while his first crop of yearlings averaged A$62,154, that figure would drop to $30,331 in 2009 from 32 yearlings sold and in 2010 the average paid for his progeny was only moderately higher at A$35,850 - a far-cry from the A$563,214 he would average from his penultimate yearlings through the ring.

Not A Single Doubt would earn his first fee increase to A$24,750 in 2011, but it was his 2010 crop that delivered his first superstar of the turf, with Blue Diamond Stakes winner Miracles Of Life, who defeated Fast ‘N’ Rocking - a son of fellow 2005 first season sire Fastnet Rock - by a length and a half to win the juvenile Group 1 contest at Caulfield.

A subsequent fee increase to A$33,000 followed, a figure at which he remained for three seasons until raised to A$71,500 in 2016, a year in which he finished second in the sires' premiership behind only Winx’s sire Street Cry, trailing the Darley shuttle stallion by just A$474,000.

Between 2013 and 2016 he added three further Group 1 winners, including the Nick Olive-trained Vinery Stud Stakes winner Single Gaze and a second Blue Diamond Stakes winner courtesy of his now prolific sire-son Extreme Choice.

By 2017, and having earned another raise in his service fee to A$88,000, a move which followed his first million-dollar yearling in the sales ring, Not A Single Doubt was the sire of 43 stakes winners, seven of which at Group 1 level.

His greatest triumph as a sire arrived in 2020, the year he was retired from stud duty, when his scintillating juvenile Farnan emphatically won the Golden Slipper Stakes, defeating champion filly Away Game by a length and three-quarters. By this time Not A Single Doubt had reached a career-high service of A$110,000 in 2019 for his final book of mares.

Farnan won the Golden Slipper in 2020 for his sireCredit: Jenny Evans

In a stud career that spanned 15 years, Not A Single Doubt has sired 79 stakes winners to date, with 53 of those having derived from his final eight crops which, due to fertility issues, account for only 605 of his live foals - just 45 per cent of his total number.

He is the damsire of 12 stakes winners, including Hong Kong Group 1 winner Seasons Bloom.

“He wasn’t a big horse, he was quite small. And you wouldn’t have described him as a particularly elegant looking animal,” Messara said. “His coat wasn’t always as silky as others, but he put some guts into his produce and he had a lovely family.

“You couldn’t cover huge numbers with him as, a bit like his son Extreme Choice, he always had fertility issues. But he more than paid his way. He was a great stalwart for us and a very popular horse in the second half of his career when he finally broke through.

“There’s a bunch [of sire sons] there and his daughters as well, they’ll no doubt have an influence because his pedigree is so good.”

Not A Single Doubt, himself a A$210,000 yearling from the 2003 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, is from one of the most potent families in the Australian Stud Book.

His dam, the stakes-placed Singles Bar, is also the producer of Magic Night Stakes runner-up Hanky Panky and stakes placegetter Natural Is My Name, while she is granddam to five stakes winners, including Golden Slipper placegetters Zizou and Oohood, the latter the winner of the Flight Stakes at three.

Also deriving from his first dam is dual juvenile Group 1 winner and Coolmore stallion King’s Legacy, while Group 1 winners Snippets, Rewaaya, Sense Of Occasion and Forensics also emanate from this family.

Not A Single Doubt’s legacy is continued by his sire-sons Farnan and Extreme Choice - the sire of Golden Slipper winner Stay Inside - as well as Widden Stud residents Anders and Doubtland, and Aquis Farm’s Dubious.

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