As the racing world continues to follow the ongoing fallout from Medina Spirit's disqualification from the 2021 Kentucky Derby for a betamethasone overage, it has left plenty of time to consider the original horse to be taken down from first in the classic race for a positive.
Most of the stories about Dancer's Image following his disqualification from the 1968 Derby for a phenylbutazone overage center around the lengthy and fruitless court battle staged by owner and breeder Peter Fuller to have the result overturned. However, the horse himself had his own story to tell at stud, starting in Maryland, and reaching around the world.
Dancer's Image, a son of the great Native Dancer, raced just one more time after the Kentucky Derby, crossing the wire third in the Preakness Stakes but getting taken down again, this time for interference. He was training toward the Belmont Stakes, but an ankle injury ended his career less than a week before the race. Fuller took his horse back to his Runnymede Farm in Northampton, N.H., for the remainder of the summer until stud plans could be firmed up.
Five months after his eventful stint in the Triple Crown, it was announced that Dancer's Image would debut at stud at Glade Valley Farm in Frederick, Md., for the 1969 breeding season. Fuller told the media that the horse was syndicated for $2 million, with 32 shares, and the horse stood for an advertised fee of $12,500 (about $90,958 adjusted for inflation).
Breeders immediately responded to would've-been Derby winner, booking him full before he even stepped on the van from New Hampshire. In a time when stud books were a fraction of the 200-plus mares a stallion can see today, a “full book” meant a debut crop consisting of 26 foals.
Even without the Derby win on his resume, there was plenty on the race record of Dancer's Image to draw in breeders. He'd won 12 of 24 starts up and down the east coast and in Ontario, with stakes wins at seven different tracks.
Dancer's Image won four stakes races as a juvenile, highlighted by the Grey Handicap at Woodbine and the Maryland Futurity Stakes at Laurel Park. He left the gate in the Kentucky Derby as the betting public's second choice after a spring 3-year-old campaign that featured wins in the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct and Governor's Gold Cup Stakes at Bowie Race Course; a $100,000 event (over $767,000 after inflation).
The first runners by Dancer's Image hit the racetrack in 1972, the same year that the Kentucky Court of Appeals ended Fuller's journey to reinstate his horse's Derby win, and the prize money was finally awarded to Forward Pass.
The star of that debut crop was Smooth Dancer, a colt who won the Grade 3 New Orleans Handicap during his 4-year-old season. However, the more immediate standout was Kabylia, who earned a stakes placing in France as a juvenile, and unknowingly foreshadowed what was to come for her sire.
Kabylia was one of eight foals from her sire's initial 26-horse crop to either be born in Europe or exported to the continent to race.
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If you appreciate our work, you can support us by subscribing to our Patreon stream. Learn more.Dancer's Image remained popular with North American breeders – he was booked full in his second season, as well – but Fuller saw the trend with where his stallion was seeing his greatest success. He was growing restless with the quality of mares his stallion was seeing by his third and fourth books, and he told the Daily Racing Form's Joe Hirsch in 1972 that he'd invested heavily in Dancer's Image's overseas success.
“I've sold or leased a number of mares in foal to Dancer's Image to French owners,” Fuller said. “Daniel Wildenstein, for instance, has a couple of the mares, who have dropped their foals in France…I have a couple of horses over there, too, with Dick Carver at Chantilly, and I expect to go racing in Paris this summer. Wouldn't it be great if 'Dancer' made on both sides of the Atlantic?'”
Within a couple years, that relationship with Wildenstein had developed to the point where the French art dealer and noted Thoroughbred owner leased the stallion and sent him to stand the 1974 breeding season at Killeen Castle Stud in Ireland.
The dividends were immediate, even if the seeds were planted during Dancer's Image's time in North America. His second crop featured Lianga, whose 1975 campaign saw her earn champion sprinter honors in France, and she won a pair of Group 2 races in England.
That second crop also featured Saritamer, who earned England's champion sprinter title in 1974 and was a Group 2 winner in Ireland.
However, the most qualified candidate for the title of best runner by Dancer's Image arguably came in the stallion's final North American crop, but the song remained the same. Though he was born in the U.S., Godswalk became a star sprinter across the pond, earning Ireland's champion 2-year-old colt title in 1976, and winning the G1 King's Stand Stakes on the Royal Ascot card a year later.
Before long, Wildenstein had seen enough, and he purchased the horse outright for an estimated $1 million in 1976. Dancer's Image was moved to Alec Head's Haras du Quesnay in Calvados, France.
Continuing the “mirror reflection” path of his stud career, Dancer's Image suddenly got hot in the U.S. with European-born runners.
After starting his career in France, Go Dancer became a strong runner in Southern California, winning the Escondido Handicap and setting the track record for a mile at Del Mar. French-born Dancing Master parlayed a Group 2-placed stakes-winning career in his home country into a Grade 2-placed career and a place at stud in the U.S.
The poster child for this movement, though, was Mistretta, a Group 3-placed stakes winner in her native France, who went on to become a Grade 2 winner after her transatlantic flight.
Dancer's Image was a good sire, especially of sprinters, but his output struggled to match what got him through the door in Europe. After three years in France, the stallion was sold to Koichiro Hayata of Japan for the 1980 breeding season. Forward Pass, the horse that assumed the first-place position after Dancer's Image was disqualified, had already been standing in Japan for two years.
“I like the Native Dancer Line very much, so I bought Dancer,” Hayata told Jim Bolus of Post Time USA in 1991. “At the time, I bought Satingo, by Petingo. I saw Dancer in France after I bought Satingo. I liked both stallions. I couldn't decide whether to buy two. Then, I called overseas to Japan to my wife to discuss it. She said she loved Dancer more than Satingo. So I bought Dancer.”
Once again, Dancer's Image was well met in his new residence, covering up to 75 mares per year. He was Japan's leading first-year stallion of 1983, and he regularly finished in the top 20 by earnings on the country's general sire list.
Dancer's Image seemed to find his stride in the Japanese ranks, at least in terms of siring good horses in the part of the world where he currently resided. The best among them was Long Leather, a filly who won the Group 2 Rose Stakes and finished second in the Japanese 1,000 Guineas.
Japan would be the last stop for Dancer's Image, who died on Dec. 26, 1992 at age 27.
As a sire of sires, his U.S.-born offerings proved to be the most significant. Godswalk begat Provideo, who tied an English record of 16 wins as a juvenile that stood for a century. He also had Celestial Dancer, who became one of Australia's most prolific sires.
Saritamer sired the top filly Time Charter, who was named England's champion older mare of 1983.
As one might expect, Dancer's Image's broodmare sire record dots practically every corner of the map, with wins including the Australian 1,000 Guineas, the Japanese 2,000 Guineas and St. Leger, and the Group 1 Prix Lupin in France.
In North America, his most lasting impact came north of the border, as the broodmare sire of 1999 Canadian Broodmare of the Year Sharpening Up, through his daughter Twisp.
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