Photo Credit: Anne Eberhardt

Bo Hirsch is the April TOBA Member of the Month.

Bo Hirsch was bred to succeed. Like some of the greatest Thoroughbreds, he echoed his parents’ accomplishments and added individual triumphs to his resume. A successful businessman, owner, and breeder, the California horseman recently celebrated homebred Ce Ce’s Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) win and Eclipse Award as champion female sprinter.

“It was as good as it gets,” Hirsch mused of the Breeders’ Cup. “I mean, that’s why I’m in the business and why I love it so much. You breed and you race for days like that and hope you’ll have them, knowing the odds are that you won’t, and when they do happen, you go, ‘Oh my goodness. It’s even better than I thought it would be.’ You get to live on the memories and every day I think a little bit about it. It was just wonderful; it’s just packed full of wonderful after-feelings or whatever the right way is to describe it.”

Hirsch’s father, Clement, was the founding director of the Oak Tree Racing Association. Namesake of a grade 1 race at Del Mar, he also headed up pet food, grocery, and pre-portioned meal companies. Bo was a stockbroker in the early 1970s before working in sales and marketing at Rocking K Foods, which specialized in portion-controlled meals and had a cannery. Hirsch Sr. had retired from Rocking K by then, but Bo soon proved a worthy heir. “Bottom line is, I invented a chili that took our business and ran it up 300%,” he reminisced. His brother Greg joined him in the 1980s, specializing in management and the corporate side of the business.

The brothers had grown up at the track. Greg worked on the backstretch with trainers David Hofmans and Farrell Jones. Bo took up their dad’s mantle in a different way, continuing the racing and breeding tradition. At California’s March 1991 sale of Two-Year-Olds in Training, Clement Hirsch spent $26,000 for a daughter of Lord Avie-Gils Magic, by Magisterial. Named Magical Maiden, she annexed the 1991 Hollywood Starlet Stakes (G1) and the 1992 Las Virgenes Stakes (G1), plus several other black-type races. Sent to Belong to Me, Magical Maiden foaled Miss Houdini. A homebred for Bo, Miss Houdini bewitched the competition to win the 2003 Del Mar Debutante Stakes (G1).

Miss Houdini’s grade 2 winner Papa Clem was named for Hirsch Sr. The Smart Strike colt finished fourth in the 2009 Kentucky Derby (G1). Miss Houdini’s Elusive Quality filly Ce Ce  erupted onto the national stage with her decisive victory in the 2020 Beholder Stakes (G1)—just as the world was shutting down due to COVID-19. In attendance at Santa Anita Park, Hirsch reminisced, “I remember walking through the clubhouse betting area, and I was the only person.” The chestnut mare added a win in the Apple Blossom Handicap (G1), but the best was yet to come.

Ce Ce won or placed in five of her six 2021 starts, topped off by a win in the Nov. 5 Filly & Mare Sprint at Del Mar. That triumph really stuck with Hirsch, who said, “It was a culmination of everything and carrying on my father’s way of being in the business, the breeding and racing.” He added, “But I’ve been lucky enough to be able to afford to do it and I’ve kept my stable down to a reasonable number, less than my father had, actually, at this point, and I’ve just been lucky.”

Five of Hirsch’s 17 horses are in training. Two are with Gary Stute, two more are with Michael McCarthy, and one developing three-year-old is prepping for the races with Byron “Scooter” Hughes. He also works closely with bloodstock agent Kathy Berkey.

Among Hirsch’s handful of broodmares, most of whom reside in Kentucky, is Miss Houdini. She is booked to Global Campaign after being barren last year to Midnight Lute and slipping a Street Sense foal in 2020.  Hirsch has a number of her relatives in his band, including Miss Houdini’s daughter Magical Victory (by Victory Gallop) and granddaughter Include Maxine (by Include out of Miss Houdini’s More Than Ready filly Mama Maxine). The mares foal at Columbiana Farms near Paris, Kentucky, where their babies are raised; youngsters are broken at Rimroc Farm near Lexington.

Meanwhile, seven-year-old Ce Ce is going strong after running second in the Feb. 5 Santa Monica Stakes (G2). Possibilities for her next start are the Madison Stakes (G1) at Keeneland or the Apple Blossom, and Hirsch wants to work her on the Del Mar turf. Looks like the sky really is the limit for Team Hirsch.