Hallowed Dreams enters next phase

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Popular sprinter Hallowed Dreams has been off the track for a little more than a year now, and her owners report she is doing well in her new life as a broodmare.

Now 6, Hallowed Dreams, a Malagra mare, is in the broodmare band at trainer Lloyd Romero's farm in Erath, La., and is carrying her first foal by his stallion, the Claiborne-bred Tirade. Romero said he and Hallowed Dreams's co-owner, Johnny Gaspard, plan to keep the mare's first foal and race it, which accounts in part for their choice of stallion.

"We were going to breed her to Unbridled's Song, and that foal would have brought lots of money," Romero said. "But we decided that if we wanted to run the baby, we'd go to a horse here that's a producer."

Another factor in the choice of stallion, according to Gaspard, was Hallowed Dreams's physical condition.

Hallowed Dreams last ran in Lone Star's Valid Expectations Stakes on May 21, 2002, in which she finished third. Two months later, she turned up lame in her right front ankle after a morning gallop because, Gaspard said, of a bone chip. Gaspard and Romero decided not to send the mare to surgery. They retired her and turned her out at Romero's farm. "We just let it calcify on its own, and she's barely limping now," Gaspard said. "We chose to breed her locally, because we didn't want to send her off to a stallion limping."

Bred in Louisiana by Mike Kennington, Hallowed Dreams became famous for winning her first 16 races in a row, a run that tied the modern mark for consecutive victories also held by Citation, Cigar, and Mister Frisky. When she retired, she had won 25 of her 30 lifetime starts, including 17 stakes, for a total bankroll of $740,143.

"I saw her last week, and she sure is looking good," Gaspard said. "She looks like a lady now. She's really showing her femininity."

Hallowed Dreams is due to foal in late January or early February, and Gaspard and Romero hope her first foal will inherit her talent. Romero has an additional reason to hope for that, because he owns Tirade. The stallion, a 10-year-old son of Forty Niner, is a full brother to Grade 3 winner Move. He stands for $1,000 and covered just 17 mares this year in his fifth season at stud. His winners include Forty Niner Course, Moon Tip, and Need a Rade.

"I'm not pushing him that much," Romero said. "I advertise him, and if they breed to him, that's fine, and if they don't breed to him, that's fine, too.

"All his babies are running, and I'm happy with all his babies. We've bred him to a lot of cheaper mares, and he's improved them. Hallowed Dreams is by far the best mare we've bred to him. She's going to prove my horse, and he's not going to ruin her as a producer."

To commercial-minded Kentucky breeders, the pairing might seem an odd one, but Romero and Gaspard don't much care what anyone else thinks.

"Lloyd and I are so Cajun, we just don't give a damn," Gaspard said, recalling that there were plenty of people who thought they were shooting too high when they were campaigning Hallowed Dreams, too. "We got a local mare to earn three-quarters of a million dollars, and that's not too shabby."