The fields for the 14 races that comprise the Breeders’ Cup World Championships really begin to come into focus in summer and fall and this regular feature will offer a snapshot profile of one of the previous weekend’s standout stars.

This week we take a closer look at Master of The Seas, who secured on Sept. 16 an expenses-paid berth in the FanDuel Breeders’ Cup Mile Presented by PDJF via a 3 ¾-length victory as the odds-on favorite in the $755,528 Grade 1 Ricoh Woodbine Mile.

Master of The Seas boasted a strong resume entering the 2023 Woodbine Mile having won six of his previous 13 starts with at least one stakes win in each of his four seasons of racing. The 5-year-old Dubawi gelding was also in good form having won the Fred Cowley MBE Memorial Summer Mile Stakes, a Group 2 race at Ascot in England, by four lengths in his previous race.

But make no mistake, the people behind this talented racehorse, or his connections in racing parlance, had as much to do with Master of the Seas 2-5 odds in the Woodbine Mile as his solid record.

Master of The Seas’ trainer, Charlie Appleby, and jockey, William Buick, form a potent tandem in Europe but they have proved especially formidable in North America. Entering Saturday’s card, the duo had won 10 of 17 starts since the start of 2021 in North America, according to Equineline reports, and had finished in the top three in 16 of those races. Included in that span were eight wins at the Grade 1 level, the highest level in North American Thoroughbred racing.

All 10 of those wins had come with horses owned and bred by the Maktoum family’s global Godolphin operation and included five Breeders’ Cup wins for the trio of Appleby-Buick-Godolphin. Simply put, they ship them overseas expecting to win and do so at an incredible rate.

Godolphin homebred Master of the Seas settled under Buick last of six in the early stages of the Woodbine Mile, improved his position on the turn, and then simply swamped the opposition in the stretch once angled to the outside for clear running room. According the Equibase chart, Master of the Seas led by a length with an eighth of a mile remaining and increased that to 3 ¾ lengths at the finish line. He achieved the win with a blisteringly fast final quarter-mile in :22.67.

Master of The Seas earned a 112 Equibase Speed Figure for the win and a 104 Beyer Speed Figure, solid numbers but not on par with his former stablemate Modern Games, who earned a 121 Equibase Speed Figure and 112 Beyer Speed Figure a year ago in winning the Woodbine Mile for Godolphin, Appleby, and Buick. Modern Games would go on to win the Breeders’ Cup Mile and take home the Eclipse Award as champion turf male for 2022.

After this weekend, Appleby has amassed a record of 26 wins from 65 starters in North America since 2013 with 20 Grade 1 wins and nine victories in the Breeders’ Cup World Championships. Should Master of The Seas be pointed to the Breeders’ Cup Mile, which has not yet been confirmed, he surely would be one of the favorites and for good reason.

• Master of the Seas flashed the high-end closing speed at Woodbine that will be needed to win the Breeders’ Cup Mile Nov. 4 at Santa Anita Park. It’s a race won almost exclusively by off-the-pace runners with elite finishing ability.
• To expand upon the running styles that have proved effective in the Breeders’ Cup Mile, only one of the last 20 editions was won by a runner who preferred to race near the lead (World Approval in 2017) and 16 of the 20 were won by stalker-closer type horses. The last true speed horse to win the Mile was Lure all the way back in 1992 and 1993.
• Breeders’ Cup Mile winners typically are proven at the highest level of racing with 15 of the last 20 winners owning a Group or Grade 1 win on their resume before the Breeders’ Cup, including 14 of the last 16 Mile winners.
• Appleby knows how to win at the World Championships with six of his nine career wins coming in the last two years, all with Godolphin runners and five of them ridden to victory by Buick.