WON: Sim Equinics' London Bridge Turf Sprint(G1), G.S.R. Sprint(G1), Full Speed Ahead Stakes(G3), The S. Eight Stakes, The Lil Bro Special, The Erotic Sol Special
2nd: The Unlucky Manta Special
3rd: The S. Strawberry Stakes

Fager Under Storm Champion Sprinter
*Connections of Six Year Old Delighted*

By- Roddick

Fager Under Storm has been named the Eclipse champion in the sprinting division, the Eclipse committe has announced. Winning by a narrow margin, this seven year old son of Storm Cat has proved that not all horses go to the shack after 30 races. His owner, slipstream, is obviously thrilled with his horse's win, and also thrilled that it gives some stock to older horses.

"He's raced almost 50 times and he's still going strong. I don't buy all this talk about horses being past their prime after 30 races. If you know your horse and how much rest they need, you can get them to this point."

"The cool thing about Fager is that he wasn't a blueblood out of our breeding operation. We got him out of the auction. The horse originally belonged to another owner."

Fager Under Storm was actually born at a small time breeding operation in Winchester, Kentucky, named Lipiti Farms. It was run by former owner George Lipiti, and his wife, Millie. Fager Under Storm was bred in 1997 to Storm Cat and a lesser known dam sire and dam dam sire.

"If you didn't look at his record, and just looked at his bloodlines, the only thing you saw was Storm Cat. His dam sire and dam dam sire aren't as well known," says slipstream. "One thing's for sure: you can't judge this horse by his parents."

After being bred in the first crop of Lipiti Farms homebreds, the Lipitis abruptly closed their operation and disappeared. No one has seen them since.

"They just left," said Michael Lipiti, their son, who now lives in Lexington. He is 23. "They never even told me where they were going, or why, or anything. I haven't heard from them." When asked if his parents could have been in any kind of trouble, Michael declined comment. To this day, no one has seen or heard from George or Millie Lipiti.

The Lipiti horses were then put up at the annual yearling auction at Keeneland, where unionjack bought the eventual sprinting champion for a measly $25,000.

"When I think now of what the horse has done, I'm pretty proud," says unionjack, who we caught up with. "Even thought I let the horse go, I'm proud to know that I spotted a champion. His coat was ugly as sin and he looked underfed, but I spotted him and said, 'There's a champ.' That keeps me going sometimes."

Fager Under Storm ran for the first time in a maiden special weight on the grass in Victoria, in week 725. The eventual champion ran a 69 and eventually won the race.

"That race was mysterious," says unionjack. "A 69 wasn't so hot, but he did win. So we weren't really sure what he was capable of."

A decision was reached to test the horse in allowance class before sending him to the grinding world of stakes races. Fager finished fourth in a mile allowance in Ascot seven weeks later.

"That's kind of what we figured might happen," unionjack told us. "We didn't give up on the horse, though. We all knew what reality was. For one thing, the horse had never tried dirt. For another, he was still young, and inexperienced. We wanted to give him time to see if he would mature on the track."

Fager Under Storm ran for the next two seasons with unionjack as the owner, where he enjoyed mixed success in allowance races, and even stakes races.

"There was that stakes race in Idaho," unionjack recalls, "where it was his second stakes race, but the other one he caught an off track. So when he just flew out of the gate and won that race gate to wire, we were all there, we just looked at each other and said, 'My God, did that really just happen?'"

That, however, and another stakes win in South Carolina were the high points of Fager's season that year.

"Later on that year, he began to decline. His figures were down, he wasn't running as well as he used to, and we decided that the wear and tear might be getting to him. We began to seriously think if we wanted to hang on to him or not."

They did decide to, and Fager provided one win in eight races in the 2002 season, an allowace win in Oklahoma. However, that was his only win that year, and unionjack was looking to unload him if there were any interested buyers.

"We all know the risk you take when you sell a horse, or get rid of it," unionjack said. "He could one day be a champion. In this case, yes, it happened that way. I'm happy for the horse, though. We're not going to let this knock the wind out of us. We've still got some horses that we own that we think could be champions."

Fager's last race for unionjack came in 1642, in an allowance race in Utah. He finished 11th.

"That was the final straw for us. We had another owner interested in the horse, and we decided we'd take our chances. We decided to sell him."

Fager Under Storm was sold to slipstream for $50,000. After giving the horse some time off, slipstream debuted him in an allowance race on the grass in Norway. The horse finished fourth, running a triple digit speed figure in an impressive effort.

"I think that was kind of appropriate, that the horse had kind of, turned over a new leaf. It was time to take this horse to the top. The horse was ready, we were ready, and it turned out that we were a pretty good team."

Four weeks later, Fager won an allowance race back on the dirt in Denmark. It was the beginning of an amazing run for a horse who had already run for three years. Fager went on to win four more races that year, for a total of five wins out of eleven races in the 2003 season. The final race that season for Fager was a stakes race in Northern California, which he won easily.

"Last year was an exciting time for us," slipstream recalls. "The question was, how far could the horse go?" They were about to find out.

Fager debuted this year in a stakes in Mississippi, finishing third. He followed that up with a stakes win in Denmark, then a place in a stakes in Kansas. However, Fager Under Storm was about to shock the sim horse racing world with an amazing run. The old horse who came from nowhere was about to show everybody the kind of heart and guts he had.

Fager's amazing run began in New South Wales in 2076, where he won an allowance going away. He then captured The S. Eight Stakes in Wisconsin in 2111, winning by two lengths. He then shocked his owner by capturing his first graded stakes win of his career, winning The Full Speed Ahead Stakes, a G3, in Minnesota. The G.S.R. Sprint was next on his agenda, where he returned to Victoria, where his very first race was, to capture his first G1 race. He then shipped to North Korea to capture The Erotic Sol Special, and finally capped off his amazing season with a win in The London Bridge Turf Sprint Equinics race in Athens, in 2216.

"That run was like walking on air. I kept waiting for him to reach his breaking point. We thought it might be the G.S.R. race, but he just kept on chugging. When he won the Equinics race, I figured we might have the sprinting championship in the bag. But I wasn't about to jinx him (laughs)."

"From a broken down breeding barn to champion sprinter is a pretty incredible achievement," says slipstream. "It couldn't have happened to a better horse. He tries his heart out every time he's on the track. He's been beat up pretty badly, but he just kept trying. He never gave up. You don't see too many horses like that."

When asked about potential plans for the horse, including possible retirement, slipstream told us that, "they're playing it by ear right now. However, with all the horse did last year, I don't know how much more he could do. He is getting old. We'll see."

Congratulations again to Fager Under Storm and all his connections.