Lyle MacArthur and the connections of Secrets Nephew have much to be proud of. The classy pacer has banked over $1 million in purses and earned a job in the breeding shed. Now MacArthur is looking to strike gold again with
the stallion's full younger brother, Secretsothernephew, who has taken a bit of a bumpy road to the races thus far.
"This year on the WEG circuit I'm bringing out a full brother to Secrets Nephew, Secretsothernephew," the horseman explained during a recent interview with the Woodbine Entertainment Group which aired last week's edition of Race Night on The Score. "He's a Camluck colt and I'm expecting big things out of him this year."
Secretsothernephew has recorded a trio of second-place finishes in his four starts this season. Although he holds a qualifying mark of 2:02 over Flamboro Downs, the colt went a pretty good mile from Post 10 April 19 at Woodbine Racetrack. In what was his seventh-ever pari-mutuel start, Secretsothernephew made the lead in the second quarter of the dash, cut the middle fractions and finished a close second (one and a half lengths in arrears). He paced his mile in 1:54.4.
Although his racing record doesn't jump off the page the way his older brother's may, three-year-old Secretsothernephew is probably just happy to be out on the racetrack.
"This guy has overcome a lot," MacArthur explained. "When he was four weeks old, for example, he hurt his eye up at Seelster Farms. It was very traumatic for him, I think, because he was a baby. To be honest with you, when he was getting broke to be put in the cart, it never really affected him. It doesn't seem to bother him. He doesn't wear a special bridle or anything. He's learned to adapt with it and he's become a pretty nice little racehorse."
"I wasn't worried about the injury to his eye," said Tammy Aspden, Secretsothernephews' co-owner. "Armbro Chronicle, he lost an eye in a similar situation to Secretsothernephew, only he lost the entire eye, while 'Secrets' is more nerve damage, but he's a fantastic racehorse, you can't say anything else about him. If he turns out to be half the horse that Secrets Nephew or Armbro Chronicle is than he will pay for himself, so I thought he was worth the gamble, and that is what horse racing is, a gamble."
"When he was two he had the speed, but he just didn't have the endurance," MacArthur explained. "He could go very fast but couldn't carry the speed. He was kind of like a lot of what the whole family has been, they've excelled more as three, four and five-year-olds than they did at two, so we raced him three times and decided to quit with him for the rest of the year and bring him back as a three-year-old."
In the interview, MacArthur said that Secretsothernephew has a very similar gait to his older brother, and that he really covers the ground a lot like him. "Actually, this horse probably covers it a little better -- he's a little lower to the ground -- but to compare him to [Secrets Nephew] he's got a lot of big shoes to fill, but I'm quite pleased with him, considering what he has done."
It is obvious that Secretsothernephew knows a little something about overcoming adversity. That ability to overcome adversity is going to be put to the test in a few months, as MacArthur explained that the colt recently suffered a setback.
"We had a little bit of bad luck after his last race (April 19). He's got a little bit of an issue with one front splint -- he broke a tip off of one splint bone, so I booked him for surgery to have it taken out. I'd say that he's probably going to miss about two months of racing.
"I'm hoping he can race in sires stakes later on in the year. It'll depend on how he comes back and everything. If he's not as good until later three or early four, then we will wait on him. We'll do whatever we have to do with him."
MacArthur gave an update on what Secrets Nephew has been up to in the breeding shed and speculated somewhat on what the future may hold for him.
"Right now Secrets Nephew is standing stud at Mac Lilley's farm. The last report that I got he has right around 50 mares. We haven't ruled out the possibility that in the fall we will try to bring him back and race him. If he comes back and feels like he wants to go out and race for three or four months we will train him down and see what happens. If he doesn't, then next year he will stand stud again."