WHAT is strange about 2021 looking like it will belong to a £180million horse worth more than Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi combined?
Well, that horse won’t run a single race.
As contests all over the world take place with mega cash on the line, one horse will continue to stand head and shoulders above the rest.
But he is not some swashbuckling up-and-comer dazzling fans watching on TV.
No, this legend of racing is 23 and lives a peaceful live in Ireland having sex with 120 female horses a year at around £600,000 a go.
Meet Galileo.
This Irish thoroughbred was pretty good as a racehorse, winning six times in eight races from October 2000 to 2001.
But whatever cash he made on the track has been totally and utterly dwarfed by his earnings off it – which basically come down to what people are willing to pay for his sperm, along with the winning potential of his offspring.
When it is all added together, no other horse can come close.
Heck, Galileo is even worth more than the current transfer market values of Juventus hero Ronaldo (£54m) and Barcelona icon Messi (£72m), who combined fall £54m short of Galileo’s estimated worth.
Even World Cup winner Kylian Mbappe, who with a market value of £162m according to transfermarkt.co.uk is the most lucrative on the planet, cannot come close.
Galileo’s progeny – a racing term for sons and daughters and other descendants – won just under £5.3m in Britain and Ireland in 2020.
That is more than double what the second-best stud horse managed.
His offspring’s earnings in Europe last year was around £6.4m.
After his daughter Peaceful won the Irish 1000 Guineas in June, Galileo became the most successful Group 1 sire of all time.
Group 1s are the highest level of horse racing, like winning the Champions League or a tennis grand slam.
Even Galileo’s unfancied kids, like Serpentine, can win the big ones, as the 25-1 chance proved when landing the Epsom Derby last year.
They can continue to shine this year, alongside the likes of Mogul, Love and early Group 1 winner Shale.
What this all means is that when you trace the bloodline of winners all over the world, they come back to Galileo with alarming regularity.
And so, barring an absolutely miraculous year from a rival, it will be in 2021.
This will be the 14th season as a ‘private’ stallion for Galileo – once labelled the ‘ruler of the world’.
But he is hardly putting his feet up.
He covered – a horse racing term for had sex with – 120 female horses in 2020.
Should he manage the same number this year then Coolmore stud, who own him, will pocket somewhere around £72m from that alone.
That’s where the true money-making potential comes in – and is without all his winners on the track.
The only thing left to do is beat Sadler’s Wells’ record of 14 sire championships – basically an award for the dad with the most winners.
Funnily enough, Sadler’s Wells was Galileo’s old man.
With every other record smashed, expect Galileo, who has 12 championships, to claim this one too.
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