HOW SEA BIRD WAS BRED
Jean Ternynck, Sea Bird’s breeder, achieved extraordinary success with a small number of mares, producing three classic winners among a fine string of very good horses. Here is the story of his breeding operation and how he produced his champion!
By Adrien Cugnasse
Massine (Consols) won the 1924 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (Gr1) in the colours of Henri Ternynck. He also won the Ascot Gold Cup (Gr1), thus achieving a double that only three horses have accomplished in a century. An exceptional racehorse – 12 wins including nine Group races – Massine was crowned leading sire in France in 1932 and 1936 on the flat, but also in 1935 over jumps. But Henri Ternynck had not bred Massine. And it was his nephew, Jean Ternynck, who became the family’s great breeder!
Love at first sight for Maurepas
Jean Ternynck, the breeder of Sea Bird (Dan Cupid), loved to ride horses. And he was in the saddle every morning in Roubaix before starting his working day. An industrialist from the north of France, he regularly went to the races in Paris in his youth. It was there that he saw Maurepas (Aethelstan) in action in the colours of Jean Prat. Philippe Ternynck explains: « It must be acknowledged that my father was a very good judge. Like Étienne Pollet, he had an eye. And when he saw Maurepas run, he said to himself that he would like to have offspring from this future stallion… if one day he had racehorses. That’s how it started. » The future great breeder was impressed by the fact that Maurepas was able to win over 1,100m at 2 years old and over 4,000m at 4 years old! Maurepas was indeed the winner of the Grand Prix de Paris (then over 3,000m), the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud (then over 2,500m) and the Prix de Chantilly (now Prix Niel). This Maurepas will have a capital importance for his breeding, as we will see later in this story.
A stud farm that no longer exists
Around the time Maurepas was shining in racing, in 1938, Jean Ternynck bought a property by chance in a loop of the Seine, at Notre-Dame-de-l’Isle. His son explains: « It was a small breeding operation from the start. After wanting to have horses, my father thought he could buy a small stud farm. But there was the war in between. His professional life, in textiles, was in Roubaix. Horses were a passion. We were very far from the big stud farms with people working full time. And then luck came along with Sanctus, then Sea Bird. Not wanting to have too many horses, my father made a severe selection of his broodmares. He never had more than seven or eight broodmares. » 100km north-west of Paris, we are still very far from the traditional breeding grounds, such as Orne or Calvados. But it must be said that the era was much less « Normandy-centric » and, until the 1970s, flat horses were successfully bred over a much wider area. Épinard (Badajoz), certainly the best horse in the history of the Wertheimer colours, was bred in the Bordeaux region. Similarly, Edmond Blanc and Marcel Boussac bred at the Haras de Jardy, i.e. almost in Paris! At Notre-Dame-de-l’Isle, gallopers are no longer bred, and Jean Ternynck’s stud farm was sold several decades ago to Hervé Godignon, a great show jumping rider.
Twenty years before Sea Bird, a decisive purchase
In 1943, he bought his first horse in Deauville, but in the 1950s and 1960s, Jean Ternynck was going to raise his hand a lot at the sales in Newmarket. At Tattersalls, he was going to find some of his foundation mares, but also foals that were going to become Sine Die (Sing Sing), second in the Morny, and Mare Nostrum (Mossborough), third in the Poule d’Essai des Pouliches. Much later, Sine Die was going to give Jean Ternynck the good Strategist (Sanctus), winner of the Prix de la Forêt (Gr1) in his colours. Mare Nostrum is the second dam of Sea Bird Park (Silver Shark), winner of the Queen Elizabeth II Cup (now Gr1) at Nakayama. Later, Ternynck also found in England Bernicia (Native Prince), who gave him Bernica (Caro), winner of the Prix du Calvados and Prix Vanteaux (Grs3)… before becoming a broodmare for the Niarchos family.
However, the mare that changed his story is of much more modest extraction. Couleur (Biribi) lacked class on the flat. But she had stamina, which allowed her to win a hurdle race in Nice. But Jean Ternynck absolutely wanted a mare in foal to Maurepas – an infertile stallion who only had 18 foals – and that was the case with this famous Couleur! Philippe Ternynck analyses: « It was the trainer Alexandre Lieux who had phoned him to tell him that he had found a mare in foal to Maurepas. It was Couleur, small, badly made and not a winner on the flat. It is also incredible that this mare managed to give three foals from a stallion as unproductive as Maurepas!« . The first foal, Camargue II (Maurepas), was very good, and she won the Prix de Malleret (now Gr2) in 1949. The second, Camarée (Maurepas), did even better by winning the Prix Vanteaux (now Gr3), then the 1,000 Guineas (now Gr1) in record time under the training of Alexandre Lieux (who had recommended the dam). You can hardly do better than that as a debut as a breeder!
A period of exceptional success for France
After the war, French horses enjoyed insolent success in England. In 1950, the French won four of the five English classics (Derby, Oaks, St Leger and 1,000 Guineas). That year, Marcel Boussac finished leading owner on both sides of the Channel, and Jean Ternynck achieved his first major success in t
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