Tag: Bloodlines

Winning his eighth consecutive race in the Grade 1 Alfred G. Vanderbilt Stakes at Saratoga, last season's champion sprinter Elite Power (by Curlin) prompted a question to trainer Bill Mott from one of the television commentators about what it took to win eight races in a row. Mott wryly remarked that he knew how hard it was to win 17 in a row.

That was a reference to the Mott-trained Horse of the Year Cigar (1995 and 1996), who won 16 in a row, then lost the G1 Pacific Classic in a massive upset. Cigar (Palace Music) ran his streak from October 1994 to July 1996, winning 10 G1 races during that time, plus the 1996 Dubai World Cup and the G1 Woodward immediately after the Pacific Classic. The elegant and powerful bay was bred and raced by Allen Paulson, who owned large farms in Kentucky and Florida and operated a massive home breeding program at his Brookside Farm outside of Versailles, Ky.

The greatest of Paulson's homebreds, which also include 2002 Horse of the Year Azeri (Jade Hunter), Cigar hit his best form at four, five, and six after Mott switched him from turf to dirt. A scion of the Northern Dancer line, Cigar had been expected to follow his sire's preference for turf racing, but instead performed best on dirt like his broodmare sire, Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew. Sold to Coolmore's Ashford Stud as a stallion prospect at the end of his racing career, Cigar very sadly proved sterile, never siring a foal, but he became one of the grand attractions at the Kentucky Horse Park, where he was visited by thousands annually.

Although there's no Cigar in Elite Power's pedigree, the chestnut champion's fourth dam is Eliza (Mt. Livermore), the 1992 champion juvenile filly bred and raced by Paulson. Other Eclipse Award winners raced by Paulson, though not all bred by him, included Arazi (in partnership), U.S. and European champion 2-year-old of 1991; 1989 champion older horse Blushing John; 1997 champion 3-year-old filly Ajina; 1998 champion older filly or mare Escena; 1986 champion turf mare Estrapade; and 1987 champion grass horse Theatrical.

Eliza won five of her first six starts, including the Arlington-Washington Lassie, Alcibiades, and Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies. The spritely bay opened her 3-year-old season with victory in the G1 Santa Anita Oaks, then was tried against colts in the Santa Anita Derby, finishing third. The filly's half-brother Dinard (Strawberry Road) had won the same race the previous year, and they are two of three stakes winners and six stakes horses from the fifth dam, Daring Bidder (Bold Bidder).

Subsequently, Eliza was second in the G1 Kentucky Oaks, and when sent to stud, the good-looking mare became the dam of Miss Doolittle (Storm Cat), who ran third in the G2 Schuylerville Stakes and then produced a pair of stakes winners: G1 Florida Derby winner Dialed In (Mineshaft) and Broadway Gold (Seeking the Gold), winner of the Astoria Stakes at Belmont and the second dam of Elite Power.

Broadway Gold was bred by Paulson's widow Madeleine, Will Farish, and Skara Glen Stables. The daughter of Seeking the Gold sold to Paul Robsham for $600,000 at the 2003 Keeneland September sale, became a stakes winner, and then a stakes producer. At the 2015 Keeneland November sale, the mare sold to SF Bloodstock for $950,000 in foal to Medaglia d'Oro. At the time of sale, the mare's three stakes winners were on the page, including G2 winner Broadway's Alibi (Vindication) and G3 winner Golden Lad (Medaglia d'Oro).

The dam of Elite Power, Broadway's Alibi won four of her six starts, including the G2 Forward Gal at Gulfstream, and was second to Believe You Can (Proud Citizen) in the G1 Kentucky Oaks of 2012. Broadway's Alibi never raced again but came to auction at the 2013 Keeneland November sale in foal to leading sire Smart Strike (Mr. Prospector). As part of the Robsham Stables dispersal, Broadway's Alibi brought $2.15 million from Reynolds Bell for Jon Clay's Alpha Delta Stables.

Bell recalled that “Broadway's Alibi had the depth of family that appealed to Mr. Clay, and she had shown a lot of ability on the racetrack.”

From six foals, Elite Power is the mare's only stakes winner. Unfortunately, Broadway's Alibi died foaling earlier this year, and Bell said that “losing both the mare and foal was devastating to Mr. Clay. Fortunately, he has the experience with the business to weather this kind of loss.”

Breeding horses requires patience and resilience, and Alpha Delta still has two daughters of Broadway's Alibi: Distorted Lies, a daughter of Smart Strike that the mare was carrying at the time of her purchase, and Prevaricate (Medaglia d'Oro), a 4-year-old.

“Mr. Clay's business plan concentrates on selling colts and retaining some fillies to race,” Bell said. One of the premier colts that Alpha Delta has produced from its program is Elite Power, whom Bell recalled as a top physical from the start. The colt went to the yearling sales without a hitch and sold like a future star.

Juddmonte, through farm manager Garrett O'Rourke, acquired Elite Power for $900,000 at the 2019 Keeneland September sale. The striking chestnut “was Curlin all over,” Bell recalled.

Then Juddmonte was required to have the patience and faith in their selection to wait until September 2021 for the colt to make his debut. Their patience is being well rewarded.

Likewise, breeders need patience, and Alpha Delta has the 2-year-old full brother to Elite Power. “Occasionally, you end up with a colt you don't mind having; this is one of those,” Bell said. “The full brother to Elite Power had a vet issue for the sale, and we felt like he would be discounted too much; so we kept him.”

Unnamed as yet, the full brother was sent to Eddie Woods in Florida for breaking in and is now at WinStar. Bell noted that “we had to give him a little time to allow the vet issue to resolve the right way, and Elite Power didn't get to the races till the middle of his third year.” The plan is for the full brother to go into training with Chad Brown, if all continues well.

As a breeder and owner, Paulson was known for his patience, often well rewarded, and now, with Elite Power, another top racer rooted in his breeding program has shown the value in appreciating the long game.

The post Bloodlines Presented By McKenna Thoroughbreds Broodmare Reduction: The Links Between Elite Power And Cigar appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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When trainer Richard Mandella sent three-time starter Geaux Rocket Ride (by Candy Ride) all the way across the country to Monmouth Park for the Grade 1 Haskell Stakes, perceptive handicappers and racing fans took note. However, with Kentucky Derby winner Mage (Good Magic) and the unbeaten Arabian Knight (Uncle Mo) headlining the race lineup, the wagering public made the once-beaten Geaux Rocket Ride only the sixth choice of eight.

So, he won by 1 3/4 lengths from Mage and paid $27.40, with favored Arabian Knight third, Extra Anejo (Into Mischief) fourth, and classic-placed Tapit Trice (Tapit) fifth.

Now a winner in three of his four starts, Geaux Rocket Ride was bred in Kentucky by Larry Best's OXO Equine LLC and is the second foal from his dam, Beyond Grace (Uncle Mo). The dam was bred in Kentucky by Machmer Hall, which sold the filly as a foal at the 2015 Keeneland November sale for $50,000 to Nitiosagan Farm.

The buyer resold Beyond Grace as a yearling at the Fasig-Tipton July sale for $250,000 to Cary Frommer, and she brought the filly back to the market at the Fasig-Tipton March sale of 2-year-olds in training of 2017 and smacked the ball straight down the fairway for a hole-in-one. Beyond Grace sold to OXO Equine for $1.5 million.

At the races, Beyond Grace was unplaced in a pair of starts at two, then repeated that finish in her final start, a maiden special at Gulfstream in January of her 3-year-old season. The mare was subsequently sent to the farm and bred, then produced her first foal in 2019 and Geaux Rocket Ride in 2020. Beyond Grace is a full-sister to Mighty Mo, who ran second in the Woodhaven Stakes at Aqueduct and third in the Better Talk Now Stakes at Saratoga.

Now as the dam of Geaux Rocket Ride, Beyond Grace is looking more like sum she cost as a juvenile, and she also repaid some of that cost with the sale of Geaux Rocket Ride, who was a $350,000 Fasig-Tipton July yearling two years ago, selling to James Bernhard.

That purchase was part of the Bernhards' initial involvement in the sport, and last fall, James and Dana Bernhard make considerably larger news with the purchase of Pin Oak Farm north of Versailles, Ky.

This historic nursery had been owned by Josephine Abercrombie, who had started breeding and racing in the early 1950s. Pin Oak is a distinguished property that incorporates breeding and training over nearly 900 acres.

Clifford Barry, Pin Oak's general manager for Ms. Abercrombie, remains an adviser to the Bernhards and said that “when the Bernhards looked over the farm last fall, one of the most important things to them was revitalizing Pin Oak for the future.”

Jeff Danford came in as farm manager for the new owners in January, and the program to elevate the farm to its historic best continues apace. Now the Pin Oak Stable has a star of Grade 1 magnitude who has the pedigree and conformation to make a stallion, and “standing stallions,” Barry recalled, “the right kind of stallions, was a key component of the Bernhards' plan to put fresh blood in the farm and energize it for the future.”

Geaux Rocket Ride seems tailor made for the job. The Haskell winner is by leading sire Candy Ride, who also is the sire of the wildly popular young stallion Gun Runner, a Horse of the Year and the leading sire of his generation with his first, second, and third season of racers.

The broodmare sire of Geaux Rocket Ride is champion Uncle Mo, who likewise was leading freshman sire and sire of champion and Kentucky Derby winner Nyquist from his first crop. Nyquist became the leading freshman sire of his group, and other young sons of Uncle Mo newly at stud include Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint winner Golden Pal, Belmont Stakes winner Mo Donegal, and G1 winner Yaupon.

The combination of stallion power in Geaux Rocket Ride's pedigree makes him a very appealing prospect and virtually begs for mating to mares by Tapit and other branches of the Nasrullah – Bold Ruler –  A.P. Indy clan of sires.

The colt has a race record that would be quite attractive to breeders today, and how he finishes out his racing career will determine the parameters of his stallion career such as stud fee and breadth of demand.

The post Bloodlines Presented By McKenna Thoroughbreds Broodmare Reduction: Geaux Rocket Ride Forges New Paths For Best, Bernhards appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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A pair of third-crop sires sent out the racers who won Saratoga's graded stakes for juveniles last week: the Grade 3 Sanford and the G3 Schuylerville.

Yo Yo Candy (by Danzing Candy) won the Sanford for his second victory from three starts, and the California-bred colt had come into the race following a third-placing in the listed Tremont Stakes at Belmont behind Gold Sweep (Speightstown), who was the odds-on favorite for the Sanford but had stumbled badly at the start, was bumped early, and came six wide in the stretch to finish second by 2 ¼ lengths. Yo Yo Candy did nothing wrong and won nicely.

In the Schuylerville two days before the Sanford, the winner was Becky's Joker (Practical Joke), who was making her career debut. The bay filly broke a bit slowly but stayed in contact with the leaders and came between horses in the stretch to win by 3 1/4 lengths from the Arrogate filly Saratoga Secret, a debut winner in her previous start at Ellis Park. Becky's Joker had been the second-longest shot on the board and paid $44.40 to win.

Her debut success moved Becky's Joker to the top of the class for her sire's third crop of racers at the track, and Practical Joke (Into Mischief) stands second on the list of all third-crop sires, behind only Gun Runner (Candy Ride), who is stoutly ahead of all his contemporaries. Arrogate (Unbridled's Song) is third, with Practical Joke's stud companion Classic Empire (Pioneerof the Nile) fourth, and Connect (Curlin) fifth. This group is notably ahead of the rest, with a $1.5 million margin back to the stallion in sixth.

The overall leading earner for Practical Joke this year is G1 Santa Anita Derby winner Practical Move, and Practical Joke is the leading third-crop sire by number of starters and number of winners; he is tied for first by number of stakes winners with Arrogate (5) and for number of G1 winners (1) with both Arrogate (Arcangelo) and Classic Empire (Angel of Empire).

Practical Joke also has sired more foals than any other North American stallion with third-crop racers; he has 400 foals, according to data from Equineline, including 126 current 2-year-olds.

Obviously, the volume of a stallion's foals provides some potential benefits in lifting him up the list of earnings and recognition, but it also has the potential to backfire if too many of his progeny are not especially talented. Overall, however, more is better, especially for the success of a young stallion in rising up the earnings list.

Of the top 25 stallions by third-crop earnings, only four do not have 100 total foals or more from their first three crops combined. Only four.

Of that quartet, two are based in Maryland: Blofeld (16th place; by Quality Road) stands at Murmur Farm and Holy Boss (19th; Street Boss) is at Anchor & Hope Farm.

The other pair of regional stallions stand at the same farm in Louisiana: Jay Adcock's Red River Farms, and the stallions are Mo Tom (23rd; Uncle Mo) and El Deal (24th; Munnings).

All the other stallions in the top 25 have more than 100 total foals by this point, and the next is perhaps the most telling point: No other third-crop stallion has more than 100 foals, except for those 21 who account for the majority of the top 25 spots on the rankings.

Food for thought?

Just as Becky's Joke provided further evidence of the success of Practical Joke and his position within this crop of young sires, where do we find Danzing Candy after his son's Saratoga success?

With 214 foals to date, Danzing Candy stands 18th on the list of third-crop sires from his base at Rancho San Miguel in California. Yo Yo Candy was his sire's second stakes winner and first graded winner. The Sanford Stakes winner is Danzing Candy's leading earner of 2023, as well.

Total volume of foals is clearly a major aid to a young stallion's potential to ascend the rankings and find a significant place at stud. Total foals alone, however, do not make a success, and when breeders and buyers have seen several hundred foals from a sire without notable victories, they beat a hasty retreat.

The inverse of this proposition makes for interesting thought. What are we to make of those young sires who did not benefit from very large numbers of foals yet found a good place on the sire rankings?

The post Bloodlines: Saratoga Stakes Spark Third-Crop Sire Race For Practical Joke, Danzing Candy appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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If anyone ever was to doubt that the quality of a stallion's book makes a significant difference to his success, just take a look at the results for Cross Traffic (by Unbridled's Song) over the past few years.

From his first crop, the winner of the Grade 1 Whitney Stakes (also second in the G1 Metropolitan Handicap) sired the champion 2-year-old filly Jaywalk, winner in four of her five starts at two in 2018, including the G1 Frizette Stakes and Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies.

In all, Cross Traffic had six stakes winners from his first crop, then three from his second. Back in April, the stallion logged his first stakes winner from the third crop when Here Mi Song won the G3 Commonwealth Stakes at Keeneland. As a 5-year-old.

There are no stakes winners yet from the stallion's fourth crop, and the much lesser representation of stakes winners is no coincidence. The third and fourth crops are the hardest for any stallion manager to fill with quality mares. A shocking proportion of breeders won't use an unproven stallion after his first season.

Period.

They move on to the next crop of retiring stallion prospects and choose one from that group. The reason that essentially no commercial breeder wants a stallion, especially in his third and fourth seasons at stud, is that no one wants to breed a yearling who will come to market once the verdict is in on a new stallion's success at the racetrack.

The bifurcation of the demand for stallions is “first crop or proven,” and it is unforgiving. This situation is self-made by breeders and stallion managers and is the result of practices that have been the norm with popular stallions for nigh on 30 years now: essentially bottomless books for the most popular stallions and an overemphasis on “stallion power.” The result is a flash verdict on stallions when their first foals and yearlings come to auction, resulting in further, mostly negative, pressure on using them in their later seasons.

With the immense crops now produced by stallions, sometimes more than 100 yearlings come through auctions for the whole world to inspect and appraise. Then they go racing with a fleet of prospects, and the verdict comes swiftly and without appeal. It is mostly “no” because the great majority of stallion prospects do not go on to be important stallions.

That's the situation for all entering stallions. That's what Cross Traffic encountered, and to his credit, he became the leading freshman sire of 2018 and is the only son of Unbridled's Song to lead a national sire list.

When mares came to be booked for 2019, few sires were as popular as Cross Traffic, and his stud fee rose precipitously. Although his second crop did well, there was no second champion. But the foals resulting from those better mares of 2019, resulting in the stallion's crop of 2020, are leaving no doubt that Cross Traffic is a good stallion.

The sire's second G1 winner came in April at Keeneland when Defining Purpose won the Ashland Stakes. The bay filly was then unplaced in the Kentucky Oaks after an eventful trip but returned on July 8 to win the G3 Indiana Oaks by a length and a quarter from Black-Eyed Susan Stakes winner Taxed (Collected).

On the same day, Maple Leaf Mel won the G3 Victory Ride Stakes at Belmont Park, and they are two of four stakes winners to date from Cross Traffic's 2020 crop. All four are fillies, and that may or may not have a bearing on the stallion's capacity to sire a high-quality racer.

One thing is certainly important. Quality in the dam is important. Three of Cross Traffic's 3-year-old stakes winners are out of black-type mares, and the fourth is out of a winner. Here Mi Song is out of a stakes winner, too.

What of Jaywalk? Her dam, the Orientate mare Lady Pewitt, was unplaced in a single start. Even so, Lady Pewitt brought plenty of the right stuff to the mating. She is the dam of two stakes winners, and “other” stakes winner Danzatrice (Dunkirk), is the dam of Tapit Trice, winner of the G1 Blue Grass Stakes and third in the 2023 Belmont Stakes.

Quality in the dam. There's nothing like it.

The post Bloodlines: Cross Traffic And Quality In The Dam appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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