This is the time of year when breeders look to the future. They are finalizing matings for their broodmares and doing every­ thing possible to give their foals and weanlings the best chance for success on the track. 

Steve and Cindy Stewart’s Hunterton Farm is doing all of those things, but the Stewarts are also looking forward to the 2022 championship stakes season. With the group of Hunterton Farm graduates from last year’s crop of 2­ year­ olds, the anticipation for the 2022 racing season can be cut with the proverbial knife. 

The 2021 Class of 2­Year­Olds bred and/or raised at Hunterton Farm includes Mohawk Million winner Venerable, two Breeders Crown champions, Joviality S and Rebuff, and Kentucky Sires Stakes final winner Double Deceiver. 

Venerable marched to three straight pari­mutuel victories at the Meadowlands before firmly announcing her divisional supremacy by winning the Jim Doherty Memorial on Hambletonian Day at the Meadowlands. From that point on, the filly by Walner out of Jolene Jolene extended her winning streak to eight, and she became a bonafide star when she beat the colts in the Mohawk Million. 

Venerable’s Mohawk Million triumph also gave Hunterton back­ to­ back honors as breeder of the winner of the only two edi­tions of the race, with the Hunterton­ bred and raised Venerate taking the inaugural event. 

Venerable’s victory over the colts in the Mohawk Million has prompted debate that she might be well suited to take on the boys again in the Hambletonian. That makes it easy to dream about the first Saturday in August at the Meadowlands. Hunterton has enjoyed Hambletonian glory in the past as the breeder of 2014 Hambo champion Trixton and 2019 winner Forbidden Trade, and just missed in 2015, when the filly Mission Brief won her elimination and finished second in the final, and in 2018 when Tactical Landing finished third in the final. Standing in the Meadowlands’ winner’s circle with the Revere bowl trophy never gets old and Steve and Cindy never pass up a chance to be there on the sport’s greatest day of racing. 

Back in the fall of 2015, Steve and various partners purchased Jolene Jolene for $200,000. All three of her foals of racing age— all fillies—have become stakes winners, which confirms Steve’s unwavering belief that Hunterton’s success depends upon investing in broodmares with the potential to produce the next Venerable. The Hunterton broodmares produced the winners of more than $9 million in 2021, which ranks the Stewarts—together with various partners—third among leading money­ win­ning breeders, which earned the Stewarts and partners a nomination for Breeder of the Year. 

New additions to the Hunterton broodmare band bring more powerful potential. The acquisitions include: 

• Put On A Show, a $2.4 million winner and already the dam of Meadowlands Pace champion Best In Show p,1:48 ($672,240);
  
• Material Girl 3,1:52 ($228,545), a daughter of Muscle Hill;
  
• Love Muffin 3,1:52.4f ($183,614), from a maternal line that has produced Cooler Schooner 2,1:51.3f and Hambletonian Oaks
  winner Broadway Schooner 3,1:53.3 ($885,933);
  
• Jolie de Vie, a daughter of Muscle Hill from the maternal family that has produced Hambletonian champion Victory Dream;
  
• Bet On Becky p,2, 1:50.4s ($225,780), a daughter of Bettor’s Delight out of a daughter of Rodine Hanover, the dam of the win­ners of $1.6 million and whose daughters and granddaughters have produced Captaintreacherous, Art Major and Worldly Beauty.

Hunterton’s investment in bloodlines, and the Paris, Ky., land that has produced some of the finest racehorses in the world, makes the Hunterton consignments the place where yearling buyers go to look for future champions. Hunterton Sales Agency sold $9.7 million in yearlings at the 2021 Lexington and Harrisburg sales. The 97 yearlings sold in Lexington averaged $81,062.

Hunterton can also look forward to its 2022 yearling sale, and beyond. Hunterton foaled 14 offspring by the trotting sire Walner during the foaling season. They then watched the offspring from the sire’s first crop, including the flag­ bearer Venerable, make their presence known on the track in a big way.