John L. Moore, owner of Biddestone Stud in Wiltshire, England, and breeder of English and French champion Mtoto, died Sept. 27, according to the Racing Post. He was 83.
A former solicitor, Moore started his stud from scratch 40 years ago on the site of a former dairy farm.
Mtoto scored his biggest win in the 1988 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes (Eng-I) and won back-to-back runnings of both the Coral Eclipse (Eng-I) and Prince of Wales’s (Eng-II) Stakes in 1987-88. In France, he ran second in the 1988 Ciga Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (Fr-I).
Moore’s other stakes winners as breeder included Mutamam, winner of the 2001 Canadian International Stakes (Can-IT), and Peony, who raced for Moore and was runner-up in the 2000 Dubai Poule d’Essai des Pouliches (Fr-I).