Mulawa Arabian Stud is our premier sponsor for 2025, and we are honoured to share their history of their fifty-plus years breeding programme through TheArabianMagazine.Com.
In celebration of the incomparable contribution the Farrell family has made to the advancement of the Arabian breed over the course of half a century, we continue our journey back across the decades and discover the success of the modern Mulawa Arabian through the lens of each of the transformative chief sires who helped to create the instantly recognisable and universally admired ‘Mulawa style’ the global community readily recognises today.
The Mulawa story continues with the recently departed Klass, unquestionably the highest profile of all the Mulawa-bred stallions and one of the greatest modern ambassadors in the Arabian breed worldwide.
The sagacious acquisition of TS al Malik was impelled largely by the desire to mate him with Karmaa, who by the mid-1990s had displaced Euni as the new, and forever, ‘Queen of Mulawa’. An exceptional blend of Spanish, Russian, Polish, American and Crabbet bloodlines, Karmaa brought to Mulawa the phenotypic excellence of both her highly decorated sire – World Champion Stallion Kaborr (Naborr x Bint Kholameh by Adibiyez) – and dam – United States National Reserve Champion Mare AN Marieta (AN Malilk x An Fayrosa by Fadjeyn). So successful did she become as a broodmare that Karmaa can now be found in over 95% of the current breeding herd at Mulawa in at least one generation, having established a foundation dam family of her own that is comprised of the largest and most diverse tail-female descendants in the entire Mulawa programme, with branches still thriving through four invaluable daughters into the fifth generation. Karmaa is also responsible, exponentially so, as the tail-female common denominator, for more Mulawa-bred chief sires than any other matron past or present, with her trademark ‘K’ namesake now found routinely in the pedigrees of many of the most universally admired and respected Arabians throughout the breed.
The combination of Karmaa and TS al Malik was repeated four years in succession for an equal gender split, the final result of which was an impressively complete, tall, and imposingly self-confident colt born in January 2003, who was christened with the unequivocally suitable name of Klass. His record a show horse would rewrite the history books in Australia, becoming not only the first horse to be named four-time undefeated East Coast Champion Colt/Stallion in every age division in which entires are able to be exhibited, but also, most astoundingly, the only horse ever to be named thrice successive Australian National Champion – as Senior Male in 2009, Ridden Arabian Stallion in 2010, and Working Stock Horse in 2011, the final title earned against all Arabian-related breeds. This unprecedented level of achievement as a breed exemplar in the show-ring, coupled with his even more significant success as a sire, earned Klass the ultimate honour of WAHO Trophy Recipient for Australia, awarded for his extraordinary contribution as a breed ambassador. The iconic Vesty photo of Klass around the campfire and the billabong in stockhorse regalia still hangs proudly in the Arabian Horse Galleries at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, nobly representing the Australian-bred Arabian horse to the world.
Given Klass’ impeccable reputation as a sire of global excellence and achievement, it is surprising to discover that he accomplished such record-setting feats with just seventy-two lifetime foals. Klass is responsible for more Australian National Champion females than any other sire in breed history, including a record number of Australian National Champion Senior Female – Klassical Dream MI in 2014, Klassical Presence MI in 2016, MI Klassic Fantasy in 2017 and Klassical Fame in 2020 – four in total, to his credit. His daughters have been exported to leading programmes in both Europe and the Middle East, while his descendants closer to home continue to excel across every level of equine sport and endeavour. While he was the second Mulawa-bred sire, after Arrival, to extend a foundation sire line successfully to the next generation, Klass is the first to enrich a third generation of descendants as successful sires, with sons Konfidence MI (ex Karess by Magnum Forty Four), Klasify MI (ex Mulawa Kiara by Magnum Psyche) and full brothers MI Klassique and Kommand MI (ex Mustang’s Magnum by Magnum Forty Four) all adding their own brand of brilliance to breeding programmes at home and abroad.
Klass was the premier member of the first generation of chief sires to reside at Alabama Stud in the world-famous Hunter Valley of New South Wales – Australia’s equine capital, arriving post show career on a trial basis in 2012 and never looking back once in residence at ‘horse heaven’. There he enjoyed a well-deserved retirement into the third decade of life, content with his peaceful, easy-going existence as the king of his domain, blessed with a spacious, shaded paddock overlooking the larger pastures of Riverslee where the newest generations of Mulawa-bred youngstock are reared and grown, many of whom share a direct genetic connection to the sire supreme. Most unexpectedly, Klass was lost in May 2025 at just twenty-two years young, succumbing to gastro-intestinal complications after a brave fight.
Most rewardingly, Klass proved to be a reassuringly prepotent sire of all the best attributes of both his esteemed sire and dam. The classic TS al Malik characteristics of superlative size, scope, substance and structure, his breed ideal shoulder, and his imposing self-assuredness are all routinely present in the best of the Klass progeny, as are the exceptional type, refinement, quality and elegance, the harmonious balance, the soft, slender turn through the neck and throat, the round, capacious nostrils, the large, luminous eyes and captivating regal presence of Karmaa, whose welcome contribution and prolific presence is most apparent in his treasured daughters.
