The Grade 3 Sugar Swirl Stakes at Gulfstream Park provided another example for leading sire Into Mischief (by Harlan's Holiday) to show the speed upgrade he offers, as he was sire of the first two finishers. The winner was first-time stakes winner Center Aisle, and the second-place finisher was multiple G2 winner Frank's Rockette, who also was second in the G1 Spinaway and Frizette in 2019 as a 2-year-old. Into Mischief's ability to sire quality speed in his offspring has made him the most expensive stallion in North America and one of its most popular.
The broad-bodied bay lends speed to nearly any mating, whether it's a distinguished family or not, but Into Mischief's contribution seems particularly effective with good lines that have just gotten stale, or faintly lacking in speed for the finish.
Bred in Kentucky by Breffni Farm, Center Aisle is out of a mare of distinguished pedigree that had produced modest results until this filly came along. The marketplace knew it immediately, paying $165,000 for her as a weanling at the Keeneland November sale in 2017. The emerging excellence of Center Aisle brought a bigger price of $450,000 at the September yearling sale, and her final presentation at the 2019 Fasig-Tipton Florida March auction realized another major adjustment upward to $1.5 million from OXO Equine, which races the new G3 stakes winner.
The filly's first two dams were bred and raced by Juddmonte Farms; the third and fourth dams were bred and raced for Christiana Stables.
Both operations were known for an insistence upon quality of pedigree and performance, and it is no surprise that the fifth dam, Enchanted Eve (Lovely Night), was a high-class racemare who finished second in the 1952 Alabama Stakes and became the dam of Tempted (Half Crown), the champion older mare of 1959.
A winner of the Alabama Stakes, Tempted won the Beldame and Maskette (twice), plus a half-dozen other stakes in a distinguished career for earnings of $330,760 when that was real money.
Tempted's younger sibling Instant Sin (Restless Native) was born a decade after the older filly's championship season and had only a maiden victory from three starts, earning $3,024.
Retained by Christiana and bred to the famed breeder's Futurity Stakes winner Cyane (Turn-to), Instant Sin produced the unraced Nimble Folly, who was unable to have a racing career but proved to be the jackpot at stud.
Sold to Derry Meeting Farm at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky November sale for $285,000, Nimble Folly promptly produced G1 winner Contredance (Danzig). Sold to Henryk de Kwiatkowski at the 1983 Saratoga select sale for $175,000, Contredance won the Arlington-Washington Lassie and Adirondack, finished third in the Spinaway, and later won the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland before it became a G1.
Acquired subsequently by Juddmonte, Nimble Folly then produced three more stakes winners, including G2 winner Skimble (Lyphard), a lovely chestnut who won the G2 Dahlia and Wilshire handicaps. Retired to the elite broodmare band at Juddmonte, Skimble produced the notably inbred Skimming (Nureyev), thus 2×3 to Northern Dancer. Racing for Juddmonte, Skimming twice won the G1 Pacific Classic at his beloved Del Mar, where he was unbeaten, and earned more than $2.2 million.
Intriguingly, Skimming was Skimble's first foal, and she was thereafter sent almost exclusively to stallions from the Mr. Prospector line. Toward the end of that sequence of minor performers was Specification (Empire Maker), who was unplaced in a pair of starts in Ireland.
With a list of duds from Skimble and that piddling race record, Specification was surplus to requirements for Juddmonte's splendid broodmare band, and the bay daughter of Belmont Stakes winner Empire Maker was sent to the 2011 December mares sale at Tattersalls, where she sold to Mick Shannon for 48,000 guineas (about $78,000). The price suggests that she was a respectable specimen, and there wasn't much to quibble about in the racing class of the dam and sibling.
Brought to Kentucky, Specification proved a dam of winners. Sent through the Keeneland November sale in 2017 in foal to the quick sire Kantharos, she brought $37,000 from Todd and Shawn Hansen. The foal that followed her into the ring was a bay filly by Into Mischief.
Now we know her as Center Aisle.
Frank Mitchell is author of Racehorse Breeding Theories, as well as the book Great Breeders and Their Methods: The Hancocks. In addition to writing the column “Sires and Dams” in Daily Racing Form for nearly 15 years, he has contributed articles to Thoroughbred Daily News, Thoroughbred Times, Thoroughbred Record, International Thoroughbred, and other major publications. In addition, Frank is chief of biomechanics for DataTrack International and is a hands-on caretaker of his own broodmares and foals in Central Kentucky. Check out Frank's lively Bloodstock in the Bluegrass blog.
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