When Trent Challis moved to Dubai in 2021 to launch his business ventures, he had no idea he was returning to a city already connected to his family’s history. Long before he arrived, his grandfather had played a quiet but decisive role in laying foundational bloodlines for one of the greatest racing dynasties in the world.
That grandfather, Jim McCaughey, was one of Britain’s richest men in the late 1970s, having built a vast fortune through his Midlands construction empire. McCaughey’s fortune came from construction, but the story people still talk about had nothing to do with building sites or contracts. It began when he turned his attention to horse racing for just a few years – a brief experiment that ended up shaping the sport in ways he could never have predicted.
Between 1977 and 1981, McCaughey built a racing stable that quickly made people take notice. At its peak, he had 32 horses in training. One of them, Connaught Ranger, shocked the crowd at Cheltenham by landing the 1978 Triumph Hurdle at odds of 25/1 – the sort of win that sticks in the memory. A couple of years later, another of his runners, Shaftesbury, claimed the 1980 Ebor Handicap at York, then among the most valuable long-distance races in Britain.
Still, McCaughey wanted more than just winners. In 1979, he bought Harwood Stud near Newbury – the place where the 1918 Triple Crown hero Gainsborough had been born – and renamed it in that horse’s honor. Working closely with bloodstock agent David Minton, he spent heavily at Tattersalls on broodmares with the kind of pedigrees that breeders dream about, laying down foundational bloodlines for something much bigger than a private racing stable.
That forward-thinking approach soon attracted the attention of Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the eldest of Dubai’s ruling brothers. In 1981, Sheikh Maktoum acquired Gainsborough Stud, taking on more than just land and buildings. He also inherited the elite bloodlines McCaughey had carefully assembled – a genetic foundation that would underpin the Maktoum family’s growing global breeding program.
“My grandfather’s work during those few years created something that reached far beyond him,” Challis said from his office in Dubai. “When Sheikh Maktoum bought Gainsborough, he took over a breeding base that has produced top-class racehorses ever since.”
After Sheikh Maktoum’s death in 2006, Gainsborough became part of Sheikh Mohammed’s Darley and Godolphin operation. From its original home in Britain, the program expanded across Ireland, the United States, Australia, and beyond. Today, those early foundational bloodlines continue influencing Godolphin’s 2025 triumphs, including Sovereignty’s Kentucky Derby victory and Trawlerman’s Gold Cup record. Many of the stable’s most successful horses still trace elements of their pedigree to the original Gainsborough bloodlines.
The numbers tell the story. Godolphin has celebrated more than 5,000 wins around the world, and its breeding business is now valued in the billions. All of that, in some way, began with McCaughey’s decision to invest in British bloodstock nearly half a century ago.
For Challis, who came to Dubai to build companies in real estate and technology, the link adds a sense of destiny to his career. Running a 75-staff brokerage and renovating an 80M AED villa on Palm Jumeirah while owning dozens of properties across the Emirates, he sees parallels in innovation. “Being here, in the same city where those horses’ bloodlines flourished, makes the story feel complete,” he said. “My grandfather’s short time in racing created something much bigger than anyone imagined, and it connected our family to Dubai’s racing history forever.”
Looking back, it’s hard to believe how much those few years ended up mattering. What started as a hobby for a successful businessman grew into something much larger – a thread that would eventually run through one of the biggest stories in international racing. Sometimes one decision, made at just the right time, can change the course of things far beyond what anyone expects.
