BY SARAH WELK BAYNUM
Kristine Gibbons of Wind Hill Farm in Morriston, Fla., had a passion for horses and planned to build on that dedication from a very young age.
“I was a typical horse girl that watched National Velvet and read all the Black Stallion books. I even went to undergraduate college in Lexington, Ky., and worked at Keeneland Racetrack in the mornings during college. It created a passion and I decided once I had made enough money, I was going to buy a farm in Kentucky and breed Thoroughbreds,” Gibbons said.
But Gibbons knew she was going to need funding for a Thoroughbred breeding operation, and for that, she also had a plan.
“After law school, I got a master’s in taxes and practiced law in Miami for about 10 years. When it was time, I came back to Kentucky and finally bought my farm. We were in Kentucky for about 26 years,” Gibbons said.
Despite her ties and long-time farm ownership in Kentucky, Gibbons chose to move to Florida where she has been for nine years now.
“We moved [to Florida] mostly because of the weather. When we were in Kentucky, some of the winters there were severe. Ice on the ground, single digit temperatures, wind chills—it was just such a struggle to get hay to the horses and turn them out on ice. We decided with Ocala being the center of the horse world, we would breed our Thoroughbreds here instead. And it’s just been such a pleasure. I mean, you can be outside every day. The horses love it—you just see them flourish here,” Gibbons said.
Gibbons has had quite a bit of success as a breeder despite being a relatively small operation.
“I bought my first mare in 1996, named To The Hunt. She ended up producing two multiple Grade 1 [winning] millionaire fillies.”
To the Hunt, a daughter of Relaunch out of the Majestic Prince mare Royal Advocator, produced six winners from eight starters including multiple Grade 1-winning millionaires Starrer, by Dynaformer; and Stellar Jayne, by Wild Rush. Starrer’s Grade 1 victories came in 2003 in the Santa Margarita Invitational Handicap and Santa Maria Handicap while Stellar Jayne’s Grade 1 scores came in the Mother Goose and Gazelle in 2004 and Ruffian in 2005.
“We were at [Turfway] the day [Stellar Jayne] broke her maiden actually, and nobody thought she had a shot. She circled the entire field and won—it was just one of the most thrilling races we’ve seen and one of our best memories in this business,” Gibbons said.
“We still have two mares that are granddaughters of To The Hunt. We’re a very small breeder, and we only breed about five to eight mares a year. But we’ve had some nice luck with some of our mares. It’s a passion—I mean, you just can’t leave it.” Gibbons said.
The main goal of the breeding program is to breed to sell.
“We breed to sell and either sell them as weanlings or yearlings, depending on conformation,” she said. “We try not to go to the 2-year-old sales because it’s just too expensive. We tried to keep the brothers or sisters of some of our greatest stakes winners and that just never worked out. So we stick to breeding.
“We’ve been lucky enough to work with two great bloodstock agents and consigners that give us guidance on which sales to take the foals, weanlings or the yearlings to. The last couple of years, we started working with Colin Brennan and his sister Kristin Brennan for Florida-breds and we’re really enjoying that,” Gibbons said.
Right now, Gibbons has a two weanlings that have her excited.
“We’ve got a really nice Charlatan filly whose half-brother [Florida-bred War of Desitiny] just broke his maiden at Woodbine. That mare [Lin Marie] has produced graded stakes horses, so fingers crossed for that filly—she’s very exciting.”
Lin Marie is by Curlin out of a Hold That Tiger mare Coy Cat and has three winners from four starters and six foals. Her top runner was Dream Marie, a multiple graded stakes-placed daughter of Graydar.
“We have an Authentic filly we’re also excited about,” Gibbons said about her unnamed filly out of Ib Prospecting, by Mineshaft. “Her half-brother [by Not This Time] sold for $350,000 in September at Keeneland to Centennial Farms. We’re hoping he’s going to make a really successful racehorse—that would be really exciting.” Gibbons said.
