biomechanics: its practical use

Measuring a horse is the first step in biomechanical analysis, which is a fancy term for using mathematics and physics to understand how a racehorse’s physical traits increase or restrict its potential on the racetrack.

[It is worth mentioning that all this analysis is only on potential. Character of the horse, its training regimen, strength of its immune system, physical sturdiness, racing environment, handlers, and pure luck all are factors that also restrict or increase the prospects for any horse to reach its potential. And it is obvious that even among the horses who receive nothing but the best, a notable percentage do not show all they are capable of due to one or more of these reasons (for example, Danzig).]

The second step in the process is running the raw physical measurements through a computer program and database that help to quantify the animal’s merits and place it in a context with other racehorses.

The best-balanced horses, in regard to their mechanical traits of power, stride capacity, and body weight, are graded as Type I. Those with a modest imbalance (or increased specialization as you want to think of it) are Type II, and those who are truly specialized for one mechanical characteristic are S (stride), E or W (light or heavy weight), or P (power).

And third, the animal is then assessed in terms of its traits and mechanics for the use that an owner wants to make of it.

The last point is very important because particular traits will suit a horse to race on a particular surface or at a preferred distance and not others.

The beginning of this process seems simple enough, and many horsemen have watched as a man or woman with a tape has measured one of their horses at the sales. The measurements typically assess the length of the neck, shoulder, legs, back, and body, as well as the girth, which relates to the horse’s body mass.

The most common reason to measure a horse is to assess the animal’s potential as an athlete, but biomechanics also plays a role in selecting breeding stock.

And, since this blog is focused more on breeding, that is the tack taken in the posts on this topic in the coming days.

blandford in the new world

In a recent post, see it here, Sid Fernando details how one strain of Blandford survived exportation to become the only prominent surviving European strain of the most classic line.

During his lifetime, the once-beaten Blandford was the most powerful influence for classic quality in Europe. Although he lived to be only 16, Blandford sired four winners of the English Derby (Bahram, Blenheim, Trigo, and Windsor Lad), Arc de Triomphe winner Brantome, English Oaks winner Udaipur, 1,000 Guineas winner Campanula, 2,000 Guineas winner Pasch, and Mistress Ford, winner of the Prix de Diane and Prix Vermeille.

Blandford represented a step forward in quality from his big and rather late-maturing sire Swynford, who nonetheless was an outstanding influence for classic ability. Among Swynford’s best racers were Derby winner Sansovino, as well as the classic-winning fillies Tranquil, Saucy Sue, Keysoe, and Ferry.

American breeders profited most immensely from this line. They stood and bred outstanding racehorses from the best stallion son of Swynford (St Germans) and the best stallion son of Blandford (Derby winner Blenheim) and the best son of Blenheim (Derby winner Mahmoud).

The impact of this trio of stallions on mid-century American racing and breeding was immense, and the Swynford-Blandord juggernaut was reinforced with less consistent stallions who nonetheless sired some outstanding racers. Chief among these sires was Challenger, the sire of Horse of the Year Challedon and the great mare Gallorette.

This classic combo effectively swamped the “American” lines and diverted them into the internal lines of pedigrees, although this effect was compounded by Teddy’s sons Sir Gallahad III and Bull Dog.

Had anyone asked a pedigree commentator or adviser of the 1940s which lines would be the dominant ones in the coming decades, they would surely have chosen either of the above or both. But by the 1960s and 1970s, they were practically gone.

Swept aside by the tidal wave of Nasrullah and alternative Nearco, the Swynford and Teddy crowd were converted to the internal stalwarts of pedigrees.

One of the reasons that Swynford and Teddy fell from the top of the tree was that some of their sons or grandsons, such as Challedon and Citation, were utter catastrophes at stud. Citation did get two top-class racers (Silver Spoon and Fabius), and that was certainly not enough.

Also, the best Swynford line in America through St Germans bred on a virulent strain of infertility that nullified the stud career of classic winner Twenty Grand, St German’s grandson, Triple Crown winner Assault, and further descendants such as champion juvenile Top Knight.

Today, the only avenue for using Blandford in the male line is to get one from overseas. Just like 75 years ago.

zenyatta: view of the opposition

Zenyatta confirmed in the matter of 20-odd strides what some of us had believed for a long time: that she is the superior of any horse in training in North America.

Languishing in 10th place in the Breeders’ Cup Classic midway of the turn, she catapulted into contention in the space of 20 strides (I counted), cutting through traffic faster than the holes could close and raising Trevor Denman’s blood pressure in a rousing call to the finish.

Then the situation became normal for her opposition. A view of her powerful rear end.

sequence that genome

Researchers from around the world have contributed to the completed equine genome study, which was reported in the new issue of Science magazine. Click here to read the abstract.

Among the researchers into the genome project are the Gluck Center’s Drs. Ernie Bailey, TL Lear, JN MacLeod, and SJ Coleman, as well as Matthew Binns from the Royal Veterinary College in London. Other researchers are based in Germany, Japan, Australia, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, France, Ireland, and Norway.

This truly international project used a Thoroughbred as the primary DNA test subject. In addition to sequencing the entire genome for the Thoroughbred, researchers also sequenced breeds such as the Quarter Horse and Standardbred, which are derived from Thoroughbred stock, the Arabian (because stallions and mares from that breed founded the Thoroughbred), and also breeds such as the Belgian and Norwegian fjord horse that are presumed not closely related to Arabians or Thoroughbreds.

 

out of the past: thomas merry

One of the voices almost lost in time is the venerable bloodstock writer Hidalgo, the pen name for Thomas Merry.

Perhaps the most important contemporary commentator on Thoroughbred breeding in America for the last quarter of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th, Merry had some decidedly firm ideas about the importance of male lines, especially those that had fallen out of favor due to the winds of fashion. In his book, The American Thoroughbred, Merry writes:

from the close of the Revolution to 1865, the end of the War of Secession, we imported thrice as many of Herod’s line as of Eclipse and of Matchem blood. And from the close of the Civil War to the present date — there were 138 stallions of Eclipse’s male line as against 172 of Herod’s and 42 of Matchem’s. It looks to me as though we had overdone matters in all three periods, especially in the second one, at the close of which we found ourselves overloaded with Herod blood. The marvelous success of Leamington, Billet, Glenelg and Buckden, all Eclipse horses; and of Australian, the only Matchem horse imported for nearly a half-century, upon the Lexington-Glencoe mares, from 1870 to 1885, shows how badly we were in need of a really good and legitimate outcross.

Despite his hobby horses, Merry was a good analyst, calling the results as they stood from the racetrack. For example, he noted that the great sire “Lexington got no sons worth being called sires, but his daughters built up reputations for all five of the above named sires, with Bonnie Scotland and Prince Charlie thrown in. Of the above mentioned stallions, Leamington did not get the most winners but he bred, by long odds, the best class.”

One of the reasons that Lexington did not get the sire sons was that racing changed radically from the days when Lexington set a world’s record for racing four-mile heats. By the time most of his best stock were racing, the sport was strongly trending toward single dashes, frequently at distances short of a mile, although there were still heat races and many long-distance races.

Although Lexington himself was able to cope with the changing environment by breeding on a nimble and swift racer, his sons bred back to the stouter side of the pedigree, getting too many slow horses.

Merry’s comments on the uncertainties of breeding and racing can be summarized by the following:

American breeding is a good deal of a lottery, at best, for horses have succeeded   here that were failures, or comparatively so, in England and Australia. Leamington made three seasons in England, during which he got 19 winners of 42 races, none of which exceeded $2,000 in value. We all know what he did here for, after being buried alive on Staten Island for three years, he was sent out to Kentucky where he got Enquirer, Lyttelton, Longfellow and Hamburg, all in one season ; and Hamburg, the poorest of the lot, won over $3,500 in three seasons, while Lyttelton was much  better ; and as for Enquirer and Longfellow, [they were the stars of their day.]

Glencoe’s case is even more startling as a reverse caused by transplantation. He stood to sixteen mares in 1836, getting 13 foals, only one being a male, which died as a yearling. What his daughters achieved at the stud would fill this entire volume if I undertook to give it in detail. He was brought into Alabama, where most of his get were flashy, the great Peytona excepted. When he got up into Kentucky and had access to the daughters of Medoc, Leviathan and Wagner, the records soon began to tell a very different story. Even in 1860, twenty-nine years after his birth and three years after his death, he was second on the list and that by a narrow margin.

Finally, his observations on the sales scene, then not nearly as formalized as it is today, follow the theme above and sound hauntingly familiar.

American breeding is, to a considerable extent, a lottery. Look at the great performers that have sold as yearlings for less than $1,000; and at the high-priced yearlings that have not since won enough to pay for their straw bedding; and in the history of those horses and their performances you find a sufficient corroboration of what I say.

In a year when the Kentucky Derby winner originally sold for less than the stud fee to produce him and when the sales have plummeted to such an extent that bargains out of those sales are certain to abound in another year or two, it is somehow strengthening to know that such economic thrashings are just part of the great scheme.

new pedigree list on twitter

Pedigree consultant Byron Rogers has created a list of writers, bloggers, and advisers to discuss pedigrees on the Twitter personal communication network. Those on Twitter will be able to follow what Rogers called “a Thoroughbred Pedigree Twitter list for the best of the TB industry … follow Alan Porter, Sid Fernando, Jack Werk and the like at … http://twitter.com/Pedigreeconsult/tbpedigree” for ped-head intrigue.

tony morris profiles pedigree with longevity

Eva’s Request, winner of the G1 Premio Lydia Tesio, is the product of 20-year-old parents, and both the filly’s toughness and her parents resilience drew the attention of pedigree commentator Tony Morris (read the column here in Racing Post).

The column provides fresh evidence that the male line of the splendid sire Nureyev is going strong. Notable in the States for the successes of the recently pensioned Theatrical and the evergreen Unusual Heat in California, Nureyev has had even more varied success with his sons overseas.

All across Europe and the Antipodes, Nureyev and his sons have exercised an effect for quality, speed, precocity, beauty, and sometimes toughness. The latter tends to be one quality that Nureyev and his stock can stand some reinforcement, and Eva’s Request found just that from her dam, the Taufan mare Ingabelle.

Eva’s Request has raced 10 times this season, has travelled widely, and has won and competed at the highest levels. In one of her farther flings afield, she won the Istanbul Trophy in Turkey, and the chestnut filly is expected to compete in one of the important international events in Japan before the year’s end.

A good horse is a good horse, no matter where she races.

ultimate responsibility

The post from Friday drew a response from D Masters, who mentioned Ferdinand as one more stallion exported to Japan but noted that

I’m thrilled that international markets are interested in our bloodstock. But if they can’t do better than eating them in the end or the powers selling can’t insure some dignity in their demise, then I am not thrilled.

The concern of Masters is shared by thousands, including those many fans and observers of the sport who were moved greatly by the death of the Horse of the Year, Kentucky Derby winner, Breeders’ Cup Classic winner, and fairish American sire in a slaughterhouse in Japan.

The response identifies the sense of remorse that some breeders feel at selling a horse because they cannot control what happens to the animal with any reliability thereafter. I know one prominent Kentucky breeder who has told me on several occasions that she is always upset when a yearling goes through the ring, especially if it doesn’t bring much money. The reasoning is that the more it brings, the better care it is sensibly expected to receive.

That line of thinking also goes for stallions sold, either overseas or domestically, and yet even then, there are unforeseen twists to the situation like we found out with Ferdinand. Exported in an expensive deal to stand at stud in Japan, Ferdinand found little success in his new home, was sold to a riding school after several years, presumably a safe place, and then was  resold for slaughter.

The problem for breeders and horse owners is two-fold. First, they cannot keep them all. Even for someone like Allen Paulson or WT Young, whose massive wealth enabled them to be more collectors of horses than most of us, there were limits. Some horses had to be dropped into claiming races, and there is no control from there on. Others, especially stallion prospects, have to find a home because most cannot stand in Kentucky and be more than glorified teasers.

The second problem is finding appropriate outlets for the surplus stock that cannot or should not be used to race or to breed. The equine retirement homes have provided some excellent care and quality of life for some horses coming off the track or out of the breeding business. But there is never enough room.

The ultimate responsibility lies with all of us: fans, breeders, sport administrators, tracks, and owners. We have the capacity to find homes, and to vet those homes to a reasonable degree, for our racing and breeding stock. Some of them will make lovely animals in a second career. Others are just hay-eating pets.

Carefully and very consciously, consider your own situation and how you might be able to help. If we don’t do it, who will?

werk’s crystal ball

In a recent post, matings consultant and Enick guru Jack Werk noted both the impact of imported stallions in the Japanese breeding industry and the likelihood that breeders in Japan soon would be purchasing high-profile prospects for their studs in this economic environment.

Werk’s comments were both well reasoned and very timely. Just hours ago, Sid Fernando broke the news outside Japan that Breeders’ Cup Turf winner Conduit has been purchased to stand at stud in Japan next year. Read it here.

When the domestic breeding economy took a tumble about 20 years ago, the breeders in Japan were riding an economic boom and took advantage of the situation, scooping up Horse of the Year Sunday Silence and Grade 1 winner Brian’s Time as stallion prospects. Those two made their buyers look very smart, especially the eminent breeder Zenya Yoshida (who bought into the dual classic winner and then bought out his partners when North American breeders were showing no inclination to support the son of Halo). Yoshida did not live to see Sunday Silence reach the pinnacle of success that he envisioned, but Sunday Silence broke all records for stakes winners, earnings, and success in the first and second generation with his progeny in Japan. See Werk on Sunday Silence here.

Other stallions or stallion prospects purchased by the Japanese did not succeed so well in their highly specialized racing environment. Among those were Horses of the Year Kotashaan, Black Tie Affair, and Criminal Type, and even champion Forty Niner, who was the leading sire in North America in 1996, never showed comparable results from his stock in Japan.

The game just isn’t as simple as it looks.

kite seeker: how about doncaster?

The Dowager Stakes at Keeneland on Sunday went to the classy Black Minnaloushe mare Black Mamba over the game Winter View (Thunder Gulch) and Ballynoe (Distorted Humor). But lost among the final result was an astonishing performance by sixth-place finisher Kite Seeker.

The dark brown daughter of  Seeking a Home had no gate speed, giving her competition a sizable early advantage, but as the field came down the backstretch of this three-turn race around the Keeneland turf course, Kite Seeker was sweeping past the other runners while under a hold. Now the field was going slowly (half in :54.31), but the mare ran up to third place entering the turn while nearly six paths off the rail.

Then Kite Seeker floundered around the turn, dropping back notably. She came on again in the first run through the Keeneland stretch, and by the time the leaders were entering the second turn, Kite Runner was at their girth.

She ran wide, losing ground and more importantly momentum, around the turn and was shuffled back to fifth or sixth for the second trip down the backstretch.

Kite Seeker came on again, although more slowly, because the other fillies and mares were getting into high gear. She got on terms with the leaders just before the third turn, was head and head for second with eventual fourth-place finisher Caprice before losing momentum around the turn, but responded gamely through the stretch, could not outkick the leaders, and finished sixth.

Clearly, from her repeated runs, this is a filly with some class and ability. But she needs a different sort of course. A leggy and rather high-actioned filly who stands over a lot of ground, Kite Seeker is not balancing well as she comes around the turns, loses her momentum, and needs time to rebalance and regain momentum. She is going to have trouble earning her way unless she finds a more suitable galloping track with much wider turns. How about Ascot or Doncaster? Or even Belmont over the dirt course?