Issue link: http://nytbreeders.epubxp.com/i/471532
March 2015 | nytbreeders.org | New York Breeder 33 Claiborne Farm's A.B. "Bull" Hancock Jr., that put her name in rac- ing's record books. "I broke the most famous broodmare in racing history," Fried jok - ingly boasted of the dam of Bold Ruler, sire of Secretariat. Such punch lines pepper Fried's conversations, creating the im - pression that despite his success as a polo player, stockbroker, and Thoroughbred owner and breeder, he may well have missed his call - ing as a comedian. As a teenager, he gravitated to the backstretch, working there, he said, but never getting paid. He continued to break horses, both at the track and at the Cedarhurst stable at which he rode, occasionally going to the track with his father. "He loved losing money there," Fried quipped. But unlike many other kids who grow up around horses, Fried didn't head for a life at the races. Instead, he brought his love of horses to Cornell, playing polo for the university team and making a name for himself as an equestrian on the feld of play. A March 15, 1952, edition of the Cornell Daily Sun noted that "Fried paced the Red attack, and his 14 goals broke the previous Riding Hall record." "Somebody from the Cornell polo team called me to raise a little money," Fried related. "I said, 'OK, I'll give you a little money, but tell me…do I still have the record?' "There was a long pause, and the gentleman said, 'Now it's 22.' I gave them some money anyway." After college he joined his father's frm, Albert Fried & Company, taking a seat on the New York Stock Exchange in 1986, following his father, who'd had a seat on the ex - change since 1919. "I must have had a good year," he said of the decision to purchase the seat. That wasn't his only ma - jor purchase of 1986: He also bought Buttonwood Farm near Rhinebeck, in New York's Hudson Valley, and in August at Saratoga, he bought a flly that would lead to his greatest successes in horse racing. In 1977 Fried had purchased his frst horse, Alpha Delta, from breeder Allaire du Pont. He was soon a presence at East Coast auc - tions, and at the Fasig-Tipton select sale at Saratoga in 1986, a year- ling flly by Irish Tower out of Social Lesson caught his eye. When his bid—the highest offered, he remembered—wasn't enough to meet her reserve, he headed back to talk to consignor Fred Seitz about a private purchase. "I was talking to (Seitz) and then Richard Santulli walked up and said, 'I want to buy the horse,' after the consignor already had said I had her," said Fried. "Somebody else was walking by and suggested we fip a coin, so we did and I got her." Towering Success earned $126,200 on the racetrack, with three wins and 17 top-three fnishes, but, like Miss Disco, it was as a broodmare that she made her mark. She threw fve foals with earnings of at least six fgures, some for Fried and some for John Gaines, who purchased her at the 1998 Keeneland November sale of breeding stock for $750,000. Her best foal was the multi-millionaire Affrmed Suc - cess, a 1994 colt by Affrmed. A multiple graded stakes winner, he counted among his victories the 1998 Vos - burgh Stakes (gr. I), the 1999 Cigar Mile Handicap (gr. I), and the 2002 Carter Handicap (gr. I). He made his frst start as a 3-year-old and won a graded stakes race every year after that, retiring at age 9. The gelding moved to the Kentucky Horse Park, where he lived until 2007, when he joined the family of retirees at Old Friends near Georgetown, Ky. "He was pretty rank mentally," said Fried of the deci - sion to geld him. "He'd go to the track on fve legs and wouldn't tuck up when he was galloping, so he literal - ly couldn't run as a colt. He didn't show anything as a 2-year-old at all, but as soon as he was gelded, he was a different horse. It was defnitely the right decision." In 1990 Fried purchased another yearling flly at auc - tion, this one at Keene- land September, that would provide another boost to his breeding and racing operation. He named the Deputy Minister—Finally Found, by Lord Durham, flly Stolen Beauty, and she got off to a sizzling start, fnishing second in the Astarita Stakes (gr. II) at Aqueduct in her second start, and capping a brief sophomore campaign with a win in the Demoi - selle Stakes (gr. I). The rest of Stolen Beauty's racing career didn't live up to that early promise, but she threw nine winning foals, including the stakes winner Moonlightandbeauty, who produced the next graded stakes winner for Fried in Giant Moon. The bay colt by Giant's Causeway reeled off three straight wins to begin his career as a 2-year-old and started his 3-year-old season with a win; faltering on the Derby trail, he was given time off after the Preak - ness Stakes (gr. I) to nurse his fragile feet, returning at 4 to win the Excelsior Handicap (gr. III). At 5 he won the Evan Shipman Stakes for New York-breds at Saratoga with a determined late rush, prevailing by a head, but while on Fried's farm that winter he suddenly foundered, Afrmed Success was a three-time grade I winner for Fried