Dual classic winner I'll Have Another will enter stud at Big Red Farm in Japan, according to owner J. Paul Reddam.
"I am sad that he is not going to stand in America," said Reddam, who bought the son of Flower Alley through agent Dennis O'Neill for $35,000 as a 2-year-old in training and won the Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (gr. I) and the Preakness Stakes (gr. I).
"I would have loved to have bred to him," Reddam said. "It seems to me that if the goal in American racing is to win the Kentucky Derby, you should breed to horses that have enough stamina and are game enough to win the Derby, but I guess I'm in the minority."
According to Reddam's adviser, Jamie McCalmont, a bloodstock agent based in England who brokered the deal, there had been plenty of inquiries since the Derby. But Reddam said the interest in I'll Have Another as a stallion prospect was light domestically.
"The estimates of his value were so different from Japan that any rational human being, as much as they wanted the horse to stand here and breed mares, would have to take the Japanese deal," Reddam said. He noted that Japanese like horses that run 1 1/4 miles while Americans like speed.
I'll Have Another is now awaiting the completion of procedural bloodwork that will allow him to be exported.
Both Reddam and McCalmont said the details of the sale were confidential.
Trained by Doug O’Neill, the Southern California-based I’ll Have Another had racing fans eagerly anticipating a 12th Triple Crown winner. But he was scratched from the Belmont Stakes (gr. I) and retired the day before the race due to tendonitis.
Shigeyuki Okada’s Big Red Farm in Niikappu is on the Japanese island of Hokkaido. The farm also stands American-bred stallion Roses in May along with 11 other stallions, including 2009 Emirates Airline Breeders' Cup Turf (gr. IT) winner Conduit and Japanese champion Agnes Digital, who was co-bred by Runnymede Farm near Paris, Ky.
Bred by Harvey Clarke, I'll Have Another is out of the Arch mare Arch's Gal Edith.
He won five of seven starts with one second and earned $2,693,600.
At 2, he broke his maiden July 3 at Hollywood Park, then ran second to Creative Cause in the Best Pal Stakes (gr. II) at Del Mar. He was shipped to Saratoga Race Course for the Sept. 5 Three Chimneys Hopeful Stakes (gr. I) and ran sixth over sloppy conditions.
As a 3-year-old he won the Robert B. Lewis Stakes (gr. II) Feb. 4 going 1 1/16 miles at Santa Anita Park, then took the April 7 Santa Anita Derby (gr. I) prior to the Run for the Roses.
Though he was unable to compete for a Triple Crown sweep, I'll Have Another joined a select group of horse to have completed the Santa Anita Derby/Kentucky Derby/Preakness triple: Majestic Prince (1969), Affirmed (1978), and Sunday Silence (1989).