T
he Incisa della Rocchetta family has been
producing wine and racehorses in perfect
harmony on its Tuscan estate, Tenuta San
Guido, since the 1940s. The Marchese Mario
Incisa della Rocchetta had long had a love of
horses–indeed, that was a common thread
he shared with his wife Clarice della Ghe-
rardesca, whom he married in 1930–and he
was a friend and business partner of Federico Tesio, who bred Ribot
and trained him on the Tenuta San Guido property adjacent to what
would become the Sassicaia vineyard. The Marchese was a heavy in-
vestor in Tesio's Thoroughbreds and, after Tesio's death in 1954, he
raced Ribot with Tesio's wife, Lydia.
While Ribot was establishing himself as one of racing's all-time
greats and soon after shaping the breed as the sire of the likes of
Tom Rolfe, Graustark, and His Majesty, the origins for Sassicaia were
being laid within shouting distance of the very ground upon which
Ribot himself had tread.
