Tag: Bloodlines

The legacy of the late Paul Pompa is still playing out on the racecourses of the world. Just a few weeks ago, the owner-breeder's Country Grammer – who had sold to WinStar Farm for $110,000 at the Pompa dispersal in the 2021 Keeneland January sale – won the Group 1 Dubai World Cup for WinStar, Zedan Racing Stables, and Commonwealth Thoroughbreds LLC, with the latter two entities buying in as partners after the colt won the G1 Hollywood Gold Cup last year.

At Keeneland on Saturday, April 16, favored Regal Glory (by Animal Kingdom) won the G1 Jenny Wiley, racing the 8.5 furlongs in 1:40.97 to win by a length over second-choice Shantisara. Sold for $925,000 to Peter Brant's White Birch Farm at the Pompa dispersal, Regal Glory was already a graded stakes winner at the time of sale, but she has done nothing but improve since.

Lane's End managed the Pompa dispersal, and sales director Allaire Ryan recalled that “under the tutelage of Chad Brown and with the patience of Mr. Pompa, Regal Glory was just starting to peak, and it was a fortuitous outcome that Mr. Brant saw the potential in her.

“She was a big, stretchy filly with great depth, a truly lovely race filly and broodmare prospect, and Regal Glory was in such good condition that she shipped straight to Palm Meadows to resume training after the sale.”

From seven starts since her sale, Regal Glory has won five, including her first Grade 1 race, the Matriarch Stakes at Del Mar last November, and the mare has won her only two starts after the Matriarch: the Pegasus Filly and Mare Turf and the Jenny Wiley.

To date, Regal Glory has won 11 of 18 starts, with four seconds, and she has total earnings of more than $1.8 million.

Bred in Kentucky by Pompa, Regal Glory is one of three stakes winners from her dam, the More Than Ready mare Mary's Follies.

As a racer, Mary's Follies won four of 12 starts, including the G2 Mrs. Revere at Churchill Downs and the G3 Boiling Springs at Monmouth Park. At the Pompa dispersal, Mary's Follies sold for $500,000 to BBA Ireland when not in foal.

Pompa had purchased Mary's Follies in a private transaction following her victory in the 2009 Boiling Springs and raced her the next year, as well. The mare's first foal was Night Prowler (Giant's Causeway), and he raced extensively for the breeder, winning a pair of graded stakes, the G3 Transylvania at Keeneland and the G3 Dania Beach at Gulfstream. The gelding was subsequently claimed from Pompa and went on to win the Barbados Gold Cup.

Regal Glory is the fourth foal of her dam, and the mare's fifth foal is Café Pharoah (American Pharoah). Purchased out of the OBS March Sale Of 2-Year-Olds In Training for $475,000 in 2019, Café Pharoah is also a two-time Group 1 winner in Japan, with earnings of more than $3 million to date.

The sire of his half-sister Regal Glory is now also at stud in Japan. Regal Glory is the third G1 winner by Kentucky Derby and Dubai World Cup winner Animal Kingdom (Leroidesanimaux). After his illuminating racing career, Animal Kingdom was sold as a stallion to stand in Australia, and Darley bought the stallion right to the horse in the Northern Hemisphere.

Animal Kingdom started his sire career respectably, but clearly his stock are better suited when asked to race a distance of ground, frequently are more effective on turf, and by the end of 2019, he was sold to the Japan Bloodstock Breeders Association and stands at their Shizunai Stallion Station on Hokkaido.

Animal Kingdom entered stud at Shizunai for the 2020 breeding season, and his oldest foals in Japan are yearlings. With a racing program that features a broad range of distances and surfaces, stock by Animal Kingdom should find something that suits their aptitudes, with surfaces of dirt or turf, distances short or long.

Of them all, however, the best racer by the gifted and versatile sire is his daughter Regal Glory, a tribute to the patience and diligence of her breeder, as well as her present connections.

The post Bloodlines Presented By Mill Ridge Farm: Pompa Dispersal Continues To Affect Today’s Racing Product appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Over the weekend of April 9 and 10, leading second-crop sire Gun Runner (by Candy Ride) picked up his fourth Grade 1 winner and 11th stakes winner when Taiba remained unbeaten in two starts with a victory in the Santa Anita Derby.

“Come on, Frank, don't we have anything else to write about?”

“Not really, Ray. Gun Runner is setting the pace among young sires and is going to lead all sires if one of his 3-year-olds picks off a classic or two. What more do you want, maybe have the horse run for the Senate?”

“That's a long-term consideration, but how about something newer, fresher than your weekly homage to the great god 'Gun'?”

Picky, picky.

Well, the last two Grade 1 winners by Gun Runner are out of mares that have extensive racing careers. The dam of Arkansas Derby winner Cyberknife won a half-dozen stakes; the dam of Taiba won 14 stakes, mostly in Ohio-bred company, but earned $732,103 from 17 victories in 39 starts over four seasons of campaigning from ages two through five.

The mare's name is Needmore Flattery (Flatter), and she was bred in Ohio by Bruce Ryan and Blazing Meadows Farm, which is the racing and breeding entity of trainer Tim Hamm.

Hamm said that Needmore Flattery “was a really talented filly. Bruce and I had worked together for 15 years, maybe more, and right at the end of the mare's racing career, he wanted to buy me out. So I sold her in a private transaction.”

Ryan raced the mare for two more starts, then bred her first and second foals: an unraced Uncle Mo colt and Taiba. In 2019, Ryan sold Needmore Flattery at the 2019 Keeneland November sale to Leopoldo Fernández Pujals's Yeguada Centurion for $195,000. Exported to France, Needmore Flattery produced a filly by Uncle Mo there in 2020.

Needmore Flattery is one of three stakes winners from Kiosk (Left Banker), whom Ryan and Hamm acquired prior to her racing career that began in 2002. For the partners, Kiosk won four races, was stakes-placed five times, and earned $115,649 from 31 starts.

That's a useful regional racehorse, but as a producer, Kiosk was even better. Although Needmore Flattery was the broodmare's best performer, she also produced a full sister, Flatter Her Again, winner of the Southern Park Stakes at Mahoning Valley, and a half-brother, Kiosk's Cause (Noble Causeway), who won the Hoover Stakes at Belterra.

Each generation of this family produced a stakes winner until Kiosk exceeded expectations with three and a fourth foal who was stakes-placed. Of these, Needmore Flattery showed the most versatility and consistency, and with her son Taiba, there has come a sparkling improvement in speed and class.

A $140,000 sale at the Fasig-Tipton fall sale in October 2020, Taiba came from the Buckland Sales consignment and sold to Hartley/de Renzo Thoroughbreds. Hartley/de Renzo put the colt in training and brought him to the Fasig-Tipton March sale in south Florida in March 2021. Breezing a furlong in :10 1/5, Taiba looked good throughout the work, then again when showing back at the barn, and the solidly constructed chestnut brought $1.7 million, the second-highest price of the auction.

Gary Young, agent for Zedan Racing Stables, selected the colt and signed the ticket, and the chestnut colt went into training with the Bob Baffert operation in California. Taiba debuted on Mar. 5 as an odds-on favorite at Santa Anita and won by 7 1/2 lengths in 1:09.97 for the six furlongs.

Shifted to the barn of trainer Tim Yakteen when Baffert began serving a suspension, the Santa Anita Derby was the colt's second start.

Taiba is the 21st stakes winner for Flatter (A.P. Indy) as a broodmare sire.

A.P. Indy is broodmare sire of Nest (G1 Ashland), and his son Bernardini is broodmare sire of Speaker's Corner (G1 Carter). A.P. Indy's son Flatter made the weekend a trifecta for the A.P. Indy line as broodmare sires of G1 winners. In addition over the weekend, A.P. Indy's son Pulpit is the broodmare sire of Mo Donegal (G2 Wood Memorial), and the latter's son Tapit is broodmare sire of Nostalgic (G3 Gazelle Stakes). Bernardini was broodmare sire of a second graded winner (Matareya, G3 Beaumont). Those are just the graded winners with A.P. Indy-line broodmare sires.

As sires, Tapit's son Cupid had G2 Santa Anita Oaks winner Desert Dawn, and Tapit's son Constitution sired G3 Distaff Handicap winner Glass Ceiling. There were multiple stakes placings for the members of this line as sires or broodmare sires.

The post Bloodlines Presented By Mill Ridge Farm: Embarrassment Of Riches Continues To Build For Gun Runner On Triple Crown Trail appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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The rich get richer, and the Gun Runners get more victories. Or something to that effect.

Gun Runner (by Candy Ride) had his third Grade 1 winner on April 2 when Cyberknife won the Arkansas Derby. It was the winner's first stakes, his third victory from six starts.

Cyberknife has been maturing steadily since his debut on Sept. 25 last year. He finished first in that race, but was disqualified to second for interference in that maiden special, then finished second in another on Nov. 5. The colt won his maiden on the day after Christmas and kept it.

Starting as the third choice on Jan. 22 at the Fair Grounds, Cyberknife finished sixth in the G3 Lecompte Stakes that Call Me Midnight (Midnight Lute) won by a head from Epicenter (Not This Time). Then on Feb. 19, the son of Gun Runner won a Fair Grounds allowance by three lengths in 1:42.53 for 8 1/2 furlongs.

The Arkansas Derby was the colt's next race.

Bred in Kentucky by Kenneth L. Ramsey and Sarah K. Ramsey and sold for $400,000 at the Fasig-Tipton select yearling sale of 2020, Cyberknife is out of the Flower Alley mare Awesome Flower. The dam won 11 races out of 33 starts from three to six, including a half-dozen stakes, and was placed second in the G3 Sixty Sails and third in the G2 Chilukki Stakes. She earned $556,593.

Sold to Arnold Heft for $45,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Eastern September yearling sale, Awesome Flower was a $30,000 claim for the Ramseys on Dec. 28, 2012 at the end of her 3-year-old season. Off until April 5, 2013, when she was once again risked for $30,000 claiming, Awesome Flower improved and won four of her next six starts, including the Lady Canterbury Stakes on July 13.

Ten of the mare's victories and nearly all her half-million in earnings came for the Ramseys and trainer Mike Maker.

That racing record made the chestnut mare one of the top dozen performers by her sire, the Distorted Humor horse Flower Alley.

A good-sized, strongly made son of leading sire Distorted Humor (Forty Niner), Flower Alley sold twice. He had been bred in Kentucky by George Brunacini and Bona Terra Farms, and Flower Alley went through the Paramount Sales consignment for $50,000 as a weanling at the 2002 Keeneland November sale, then returned to Keeneland the following year and sold for $165,000 to Eugene Melnyk. The colt went on to become one of the most successful racers for Melnyk's stable, winning five races and earning more than $2.5 million.

As a 3-year-old, Flower Alley was at the top of his crop. He ran second in the 2005 Arkansas Derby, then was ninth in the Kentucky Derby, but later in the year Flower Alley won both the G2 Jim Dandy and the G1 Travers, then finished his year with a second in the 2005 Breeders' Cup Classic, beaten a length by Saint Liam (Saint Ballado).

Flower Alley came back at four, made four starts and was unplaced in three, winning only the G3 Salvator Handicap at Monmouth.

Even so, the classically inclined son of leading sire Distorted Humor went to stud in 2007 at Three Chimneys Farm near Midway, Ky., and sired a quartet of Grade 1 winners. Bullards Alley (Canadian International), Lukes Alley (Gulfstream Park Turf Handicap), and Lilacs and Lace (Ashland) were very good representatives for their sire, but the colt who put Flower Alley's name in lights on the Las Vegas strip was I'll Have Another.

Three times a winner at the Grade 1 level, I'll Have Another was bred in Kentucky by Harvey Clarke, and the good-looking chestnut won the Santa Anita Derby, Kentucky Derby, and Preakness. A winner in five of his seven starts, I'll Have Another earned more than $2.6 million and was named champion 3-year-old colt of 2012. After being declared out of the Belmont Stakes and the potential for a Triple Crown, I'll Have Another was sold to stand at stud in Japan; he was sold and was returned to the States for the 2019 breeding season and stands at Ocean Breeze Ranch in California.

Just a few years earlier, Flower Alley had gone the other way. The stallion was sold to stand in South Africa at Wilgerbosdrift Stud for the 2015 breeding season, and he stands there for 80,000 rand (approximately $6,000) live foal.

None of those scenic locales are the destination of Gun Runner, the leading freshman sire of 2021 by a walloping $2 million over his nearest competitor and now the sire of 10 stakes winners. He remains a homebody at Three Chimneys Farm. The stallion's first crop are now three, and his son Cyberknife will be among the well-regarded starters for the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May.

The post Bloodlines Presented By Mill Ridge Farm: Arkansas Derby Winner Cyberknife’s Roots In Claiming Races appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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The story of the 2022 Dubai World Cup was the string of successes earned by the racehorses and highly adventurous owners from Japan. They won five races on the card and placed in several others, including a third in the Grade 1 Dubai World Cup itself.

The victors were Bathrat Leon (Godolphin Mile), Stay Foolish (Dubai Gold Cup), Crown Pride (UAE Derby), Panthalassa (Dubai Turf in a dead-heat with Lord North), and Shahryar (Dubai Sheema Classic). Of the eight principal events, racers from Japan won five, were second in the Golden Shaheen with Red le Zele (by Lord Kanaloa), and third in the World Cup with Chuwa Wizard (King Kamehameha), who had been second in the World Cup last year as a 6-year-old.

A string of successes such as this is akin to the multiple stakes wins by jockey Pat Day on the 1989 Kentucky Derby card, Frankie Dettori's Magnificent Seven, or the Phipps family breeding and racing six of the eight national juvenile champions of 1964 through 1967 in the U.S.

All these are extremely difficult to achieve, nearly impossible to duplicate.

All these accomplishments also possess several common characteristics: an intense focus on achievement, a consistent development of outstanding athleticism, and a determination to be the best.

In the case of Thoroughbred breeders in Japan, there is also a decades-long investment in purchasing the best bloodstock available. Even though the program had started many years before and continues to the present, the most important single purchase came more than 30 years ago, when Zenya Yoshida purchased 1989 Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Sunday Silence (Halo) after Arthur Hancock had been unable to syndicate the wildly talented Horse of the Year in the U.S. during the Great Bloodstock Depression.

Sunday Silence became the greatest sire in the history of breeding racehorses in Japan, and he is in the pedigree of four of the five winners bred in Japan on World Cup day.

Sunday Silence's near-contemporary and breeding rival King Kamehameha (Kingmambo) and his high-class son Lord Kanaloa also proved a major influence on the day, particularly in connection with Sunday Silence and his sons.

In part as a result of the influence of these two world-class stallions, Sunday Silence and King Kamehameha, Thoroughbred racing and breeding in Japan is on a par with any in the world. One could, in fact, make a strong case that the breeding there is the best in the world.

And why would that be, a curious reader might ask?

In addition to the stunning exceptionalism of Sunday Silence and his sons, another large part of the equation is the willingness by breeders in Japan to buy first-class mares out of the top of the bloodstock market around the world.

That is how G1 winner Wind in Her Hair (Alzao) went to Japan, where she produced Black Tide, the sire of champion Kitasan Black, and Black Tide's full brother Deep Impact, who became the most successful sire by Sunday Silence and his internationally important heir.

That is how G1 winner Saratoga Dew (Cormorant) went to Japan. Bred in New York by Penny Chenery, Saratoga Dew was a $10,000 sale yearling who won eight of 11 starts, including the G1 Beldame and Gazelle; was named champion 3-year-old filly of 1992; and then, in foal to leading sire Storm Cat, sold for $850,000 at the 1995 Keeneland November sale. The resulting foal, Lady Blossom, was born the following year in Japan and won five of 24 starts. Lady Blossom produced Lord Kanaloa in 2008; he won 13 of 19 starts, approximately $9.8 million, and is one of the best stallions in Japan. His son Panthalassa won the Dubai Turf.

Annually, dozens more mares of quality pedigree and performance have been going into the breeding pool in Japan for decades. Last year alone, approximately four dozen broodmares were acquired for export to Japan. One of these was the Tapit G2 stakes winner Pink Sands, who sold for $2.3 million in foal to Into Mischief; the buyer was Masahiro Miki. In 2019, G1 Alabama Stakes winner Eskimo Kisses (To Honor and Serve), in foal to leading sire Curlin, sold for $2.3 million to Shadai Farm.

This is a thoroughly logical program of buying the best producers and performers in an effort to breed the best racehorses in the world.

And it works.

From the Roaring Twenties into the leadup to World War II and afterward, breeders in America bought some of the best bloodstock in Europe. Sir Gallahad III, his brother Bull Dog, St. Germans, Pharamond, his brother Sickle, Blenheim, his son Mahmoud, Alibhai, Heliopolis, Nasrullah, Royal Charger, his son Turn-to, Ribot, Sea-Bird, and many others came across the Atlantic to enrich breeding and racing here in the States.

American breeders purchased mares enough to fill the paddocks from Lexington to Paris, Ky.

We know that such a logical approach works because American breeders have already proved that it works.

The post Bloodlines Presented By Mill Ridge Farm: Dubai World Cup Success Pays Off Decades-Long Investment For Japan’s Breeders appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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