Rio Tejo

DEL MAR, Calif. (Aug. 1, 2004) -- Dr. Rick Arthur paid trainer Gary Jones $1 to acquire Rio Tejo when severe injuries forced the mare, then 3 years old, into premature retirement from racing in 1991.

“Gary’s gotten a lot more out of me on the golf course since then,” Arthur, one of the country’s leading equine practitioners, said with a laugh.

But Rio Tejo has rewarded Arthur in kind many times over. If anyone still is owed a debt, it’s the one the 16-year-old daughter of Tsunami Slew owes the veterinarian. The debt is nothing less than her life.

“She broke her right front cannon bone so severely, the owners (Darley Stud) recommended she be put down,” Arthur recalled. “I told Gary I could save her so he let me have her for $1.”

Arthur placed five screws in her leg to fuse the bone. And while Rio Tejo was unable to resume her racing career, she has rewarded her doctor, who has remained her owner over the years, by becoming one of California’s leading broodmares.

A dam of three stakes winners, she will be represented in the Aug. 16 California Thoroughbred Breeders Association Yearling Sale at Del Mar by Hip 59, a dark bay or brown colt sired by Bertrando. He is Rio Tejo’s ninth foal in a prolific breeding career that recently earned her the title of the CTBA’s 2003-2004 Broodmare of the Year.

“We have hopes he’ll sell well,” Arthur said of the yearling colt, who is the second of Rio Tejo’s offspring to result from a mating to Bertrando. Runaway Mother, a filly who sold at Del Mar for $200,000, has earned $25,510. “He appears to be correct in his conformation and is a very nice-looking horse.”

Bred in Kentucky by North Ridge Farm, Rio Tejo is out of Celebration Song, a half-sister to Seattle Song, one of the world’s top turf runners of his generation and winner of the D. C. International in 1984. Sheikh Mohammed’s Darley Stud Management bought her as a yearling in 1989 for $110,000, the second highest price paid for a son or daughter of Tsunami Slew at auction that year.

Her top runners have been Rio Oro, by Oraibi, and two sons of Memo, Giovannetti, and Guillermo. Like Rio Tejo, Oraibi underwent cannon bone surgery before that mating. Rio Oro went on to win 14 races, most notably the San Miguel Stakes and California Cup Starter Sprint Handicap at Santa Anita, en route to $341,854 in earnings.

Giovannetti has won more than $320,000 during a career that has produced eight victories, including stakes successes in the Phoenix Gold Cup at Turf Paradise and the Ken Maddy Sprint Handicap at Golden Gate Fields.

Guillermo, who was campaigned by Arthur, won four races, including the Real Good Deal Stakes at Del Mar, and earned $182,404.

Rio Tejo, named for the Tagus River in Portugal, currently is carrying an In Excess foal and being cared for at the Vessels Stallion Farm in Bonsall.

“The five screws in her leg have never bothered her,” Arthur said. “I’ve put more screws than that in some horses’ legs and had them go back to racing. When I operated on her, the techniques weren’t as advanced as they are today. But I have no complaints, and I’m sure neither does she. “
--By Larry Bortstein

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