The Aria Journey
The Aria Journey » The *Emandoria Story
The *Emandoria Story
How fortunate to be able to have leased both *Pianissima - the queen of Janow Podlaski and *Emandoria - the queen of Michalow State Stud. This is my story of the *Emandoria experience....
In May of 2005 my family was invited to go to Poland to preview the sale horses which would be in the Pride of Poland auction in August. Greg Gallun and George Z were our hosts. It was our first trip to Poland, and it was a dream come true to visit the great state stud farms with their heralded and romantic histories.
During this trip, we saw a yearling filly during the preview at Michalow that caught our eye. Frankly, she was the star of the show. I remember that we all agreed to keep our individual scorecards on the horses we saw in the preview (which included horses that were not in the sale as well). The rating system we used was simple - One star was average and four stars was "off the charts". Only one horse received five stars - that's right - five stars on a scale from one to four - that horse was a grey yearling filly named *Emandoria - and she was a star from the moment we saw her. We couldn't stop looking at her - we couldn't stop talking about her the whole trip. She was big yet beautiful and refined - and she was sired by *Gazal out of the beautiful *Emanda of the famed "E line". It just didn't get any better than that. This was the standard. When asked if she could be bought, Director Bialabok left little doubt in our minds - the answer was a clear - very clear - "NO". (and....don't ask again!).
We returned from that trip, never forgetting about that grey filly. Shortly after that trip, we returned in August, and along with a group of partners purchased *Elandra and four other horses in the sale that year. *Elandra was the high selling mare of the sale of course, and we also had leased *Piaff and showed him to Polish National Champion Stallion during the August trip. A memorable trip it was...
Perhaps the best thing to come of that August trip, was that we started negotiations with Director Trela at Janow to lease *Pianissima and with Director Trela at Michalow to lease *Emandoria. We had lots of convincing to do. Money, while significant in these transactions, was not the issue - they obviously wanted to ensure that the best program would be behind these mares, and the combination of the Galluns to care for, train, and show the horses, matched with the Aria marketing machine behind them, seemed to have a real ring to it, and I could see the Directors were warming to the idea. However, as much progress as it seemed we made, no deals were reached during the August trip.
In the Fall of 2005, my brother and I on a trip to New York for our StartupNation business were to appear on Fox News to discuss entrepreneurship in America, and while heading to the studio, I got a call from Greg Gallun. He told me that the he had just heard from Director Trela at Janow, and a deal to lease *Pianissima could be made. It would be the highest price ever paid for the lease of a mare in history, and so the deal was risky....but it was for the great *Pianissima, and Greg and I, along with George Z's help got it done. Shortly thereafter *Pianissima arrived in the U.S. and became U.S. National Champion Mare in 2006, and on the heels of that success, the phone rang yet again. This time the call was from Director Bialabok announcing that if we promised to do the same good job with *Emandoria we had done with *Pianissima, a lease deal could be made.
And it was....
And she came to America, and was crowned U.S. National Champion Mare Junior Mare in 2007.
She recently returned to Poland and no doubt, *Emandoria will now follow in her sister's footsteps and conquer Europe and the Middle East, and no doubt she will win everything.
How privileged am I. How privileged am I.....
I am so grateful....
Special thanks to Greg and George for all of the thrills....and certainly to Director Bialabok and our partners who gave me the chance to be part of such an honor....
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