The first two classics of the Triple Crown were won by sons of established stallions whose success at this level was actually a garnish to their credentials as sires of great significance in the breed today.

In contrast, the victory of Palace Malice in the Grade 1 Belmont Stakes means all the world to the first-crop sire Curlin. A son of the Mr. Prospector stallion Smart Strike, Curlin is a big horse who tends to get stock with size and mass. They also seem to be horses that want time and some distance to show their best form, which is typical of both the progeny of Smart Strike and that stallion’s other champion son, English Channel, who got a winner of the Queen’s Plate in Canada last year from his first crop to race.

Curlin, Smart Strike, and English Channel all stand at Lane’s End Farm outside Versailles, Ky.

Bred in Kentucky by Will Farish, Palace Malice is out of the stakes-winning Royal Anthem mare Palace Rumor. The bay son of Curlin is the seventh winner of the Belmont Stakes sold through Farish’s Lane’s End Farm sales consignments. The others are Bet Twice, A.P. Indy, Lemon Drop Kid, Thunder Gulch, Jazil, and Rags to Riches. Of those, the first three went to stud at Lane’s End, where A.P. Indy has proven to be a sire of great and lasting importance to the breed.

The Belmont Stakes winner is the first graded stakes winner for his sire and only the third stakes winner from the stallion’s runners to date. That the colt has improved consistently over the past 10 months of racing bodes well for his sire’s prospects for the future, however, and suggests that Curlin, a force of importance in racing around two turns, may supply more performers with distance capacity.

That is an important subset of ability in American racing, where speed rules even more than in most environments of the sport.

And there is no doubt that Palace Malice has speed. The colt came enticingly close to winning the G1 Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland, and he was the unbridled terror who led the Kentucky Derby through the withering fractions that doomed himself and his near competitors as they attempted 10 furlongs for the first time.

Oxbow was one of those cooked in the Derby cauldron, but he bounced back well and won the Preakness over Derby winner Orb and others. Then Palace Malice, with a five-week layoff after the Derby, outfinished both the earlier classic winners through the stretch of the Belmont.

The capacity to stretch out in distance, to carry speed around two turns, and to continue maturing at a rate that maintains a horse at a high rank among his peers are qualities that help to define the premium athletes in each crop, and the first three finishers in the Belmont all hold promise of greater things to come through the rest of the year.

From the first crop of two-time Horse of the Year Curlin, Palace Malice is maturing in a pattern similar to that of his famous sire. Curlin was a horse of obvious talent, gifted with speed and impressive strength. In addition to his innate ability, the big chestnut progressed dramatically through the spring of his 3-year-old season, going from maiden winner to classic winner in five months.

A good third in the 2007 Kentucky Derby, Curlin came on after that challenging effort to edge Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense in the Preakness. That set the stage for the Belmont, where Curlin progressed again, only to find the newcomer, a filly named Rags to Riches, the narrow victor in the longest classic.

Rags to Riches was the first filly to win the Belmont in 102 years, and she was trained by Todd Pletcher, who also saddled Saturday’s classic winner for Dogwood Stable.

In addition to his Preakness success, Curlin continued to progress throughout that year and the next, winning the Breeders’ Cup Classic at 3 to become Horse of the Year and divisional champion, honors that he earned again the following season.

After winning the Preakness, Dubai World Cup, Woodward, Stephen Foster, and two runnings of the Jockey Club Gold Cup, the robust, rangy chestnut went to stud as a thoroughly proven racehorse who had won 11 of 16 races in two seasons, including seven G1s, and had earned $10,501,800. In type, Curlin resembles his broodmare sire, Deputy Minister, more than his sire Smart Strike or male-line grandsire Mr. Prospector.

As a top stallion prospect of the crop entering stud in 2009, Curlin stood for $65,000 live foal as the breeding and commercial sales world crumbled around breeders and stallion owners internationally.

As a result, yearlings at the sales frequently sold for less than the stud fee they were bred on. That was the case with last year’s champion 3-year-old colt, I’ll Have Another. The son of the Three Chimneys stallion Flower Alley sold for $11,000 as a yearling after his breeder Harvey Clark had paid $25,000 to breed the mare to the stallion and bring up the young animal to the September sale.

At the same sale a year later, Palace Malice brought only $25,000. That was a massive loss on stud fee and the other costs associated with breeding and raising a young Thoroughbred. But that is fairly typical for the results that Thoroughbred breeders have found in the marketplace through the last several years.

The buyer at the September sale was 2-year-old pinhooker Niall Brennan, who consigned Palace Malice at the 2012 Keeneland April auction of juveniles in training. Brennan said, “Mike Ryan and I picked Palace Malice out for our pinhooking partnership. We both look at all the yearlings and make short lists, and he was one both of us liked because he looked like a really good Smart Strike, smooth and well-grown for a May foal.”

Brennan explained part of the reason behind the low price for such a good-looking prospect. He said, “He had a chip in a hind ankle, and that probably turned some people away, but we never took it out.”

Another knock on the Belmont winner as a yearling was that he was a May foal. Many buyers will not buy a young horse born in May, although the evidence is strong that the birth date doesn’t matter.

Neither the birth date nor the old vet issue was a bother to veteran horseman Cot Campbell, who bought the colt for his Dogwood Stable partnership for $200,000 and now has a classic winner on his hands with earnings of $871,135.

Once again, it appears Campbell has caught lightning in a bottle.

All hail Sadler’s Wells! The son of Northern Dancer was a classic winner in his own right but, following his retirement to stud, dominated racing and breeding as the best sire in Europe for a generation.

Sadler’s Wells emphatically stamped the best races of the weekend with his imprint because he is the sire of English Derby winner Galileo (also known as the best stallion in the world today and sire of Saturday’s English Derby winner Ruler of the World). Sadler’s Wells is also the sire of Irish Derby winner Montjeu (sire of Coronation Cup winner St Nicholas Abbey and four English Derby winners) and is the grandsire of English Derby winner New Approach (a son of Galileo and sire of the Oaks winner Talent on Friday).

This was a weekend to remember, even by the exalted standards of Sadler’s Wells.

Yet even as recently as a decade ago, some were mumbling and grumbling that the great sire was not getting sons as important as himself, that his “line” wasn’t going to continue, and that his contribution to the breed could be faulted on several points.

In truth, most of the early sons of Sadler’s Wells who went to stud did not cover themselves in glory, were not producing stock of the same type as the perennial leader of the European sires lists, and were a drag on the market because of the number of sons available with good race records.

In fairness, however, the two best racing sons of Sadler’s Wells, Montjeu and Galileo, came along rather late in the stallion’s career, when quite a number of his almost great sons and almost classic-winning sons, as well as a number of just so-so sons, had gone to stud and done the predictable job.

They had stunk up the place.

The only early-crop son of Sadler’s Wells who had made the transition from racehorse to important sire was El Prado, and what could we make of him?

El Prado was an Irish-bred from an outstanding Claiborne Farm family who had excelled at 2, when he was head of the Irish Free Handicap, and then had been exported to America, where he began to get all sorts of winners. In contrast to his sire’s other early sons at stud, El Prado got more versatility from his stock: more speed, more sprinters and handicappers, and yet good class, just like the old boy and his sire before him.

Even so, especially among Europeans, the response to El Prado was quizzical, rather than celebratory. So when Montjeu came along, cracking heads and winning classics, the pressure to rush him off to stud was not undeniable, and the rather stoutly bred colt raced on at 4, adding a second season as the European highweight for his age and taking down more G1 races that included a sensational win in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot.

The two-years younger Galileo was even more impressive in the eyes of breeders, who noted that he was out of the Arc de Triomphe winner Urban Sea, herself a daughter of the speedy Mr. Prospector stallion Miswaki. So there was speed and classic middle-distance performance on both sides of Galileo’s pedigree, and breeders recognized that as a quality of premium importance for a stallion prospect.

Rarely have they ever been so right.

Just like Sadler’s Wells, Galileo has been a power from the beginning of his stud career, getting top-class juveniles and classic winners, although precious few older horses because the stallion’s best tend to prove themselves, then get snapped up as breeding stock for the coming generation.

Yet when Galileo’s greatest offspring, the unbeaten Frankel, finished his second season on the racecourses of England, he remained in training for the benefit of sport and all those around Frankel who gloried in the talent and charisma of the grand-moving bay who has muscles on his muscles.

Last year was the final of Frankel’s three seasons of racing, and Galileo also was represented by such other stars as the Oaks winner Was, Racing Post Trophy winner Kingsbarns, French classic winner and multiple G1 winner Golden Lilac, and the high-class older colt Nathaniel.

If Galileo needed to prove more, it came from the stallion performance of his second-crop son, New Approach. He had been a star of his division at 2 and 3 with victories in the Dewhurst at 2, the Derby and Champion Stakes at 3, but New Approach showed he could pass on premium speed and class to his offspring with his first racers, which included the unbeaten juvenile Dawn Approach.

The latter won last month’s 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket and was heavily favored to repeat in the Derby on Saturday, just a day after the sire’s daughter Talent had won her classic in the Oaks at Epsom. The combination of pace far in excess of his contemporaries in the Derby and the jockey’s unwillingness to allow the colt to use it cancelled any chance Dawn Approach had in the 12-furlong classic.

The winner with a dramatic finish was Ruler of the World, a half-brother to the international racing star Duke of Marmalade (by Danehill), who won G1 races in England, France, and Ireland. He comes from a top-class family made famous at Lane’s End by leading sires A.P. Indy and Summer Squall.

An improving colt who clearly appreciates a distance of ground, Ruler of the World is now unbeaten in three starts.

Yet I can’t keep from thinking that the Derby winner’s name is an even better fit for his sire.

The classic season is the time of year when stallions can really fill in their resumes. Not only can success send a few more mares of the right sort into their books, but the winners of major preps or of the classic races themselves place their sires in focus for the general public, and especially for breeders and buyers.

Some years, the trend is toward new blood. And we have seen Distorted Humor (Funny Cide), Elusive Quality (Smarty Jones), and Birdstone (Mine That Bird and Summer Bird) rise in the estimation of breeders with the immediate success of their racers in the classics.

Very few stallions sire more than one classic winner, however, and proven stallions frequently stamp their classic credentials only after rising very high by other measures of stallion success.

This year, the celebrated veteran sire Malibu Moon (advertised at $70,000 live foal for 2013) sired the winner of the Kentucky Derby, and last Saturday, 19-year-old Awesome Again scored a Preakness winner when his gray son Oxbow won the classic at Pimlico. The Preakness winner’s sire is the head stallion at Frank Stronach’s Adena Springs Farm, where Awesome Again stands with his son Ghostzapper and other important stallions like Macho Uno (by Holy Bull).

Advertised for $75,000 live foal, payable when the foal stands and nurses, Awesome Again (Deputy Minister) has proven himself both a first-rate racehorse and a major league sire. On the track, Awesome Again won nine of his 12 starts, including the Breeders’ Cup Classic, Whitney, and Queen’s Plate.

As a sire, Awesome Again has sired Horse of the Year Ghostzapper, champion Ginger Punch, Santa Anita Handicap winner Game on Dude, and numerous other premium-level performers among his 50-odd stakes winners.

One of those is last year’s Haskell Invitational winner Paynter, who is closely related to Oxbow. Both are sons of Awesome Again, and the 2012 Belmont Stakes second Paynter is out of Tizso, a full sister to Tizamazing, who is the dam of this year’s Preakness winner.

Both mares are by the Relaunch stallion Cee’s Tizzy and out of the Seattle Song mare Cee’s Song. They are also full sisters to Horse of the Year and major stallion Tiznow, and the stakes winners Budroyale, Tizbud, and Tizdubai.

With that kind of family and the size and quality expected of a top-class yearling prospect, Tizamazing was a salty sales horse a decade ago. She brought $1 million as Hip 331 at the Keeneland September sale in 2003. Reynolds Bell, Jr., signed the sales ticket on behalf of Jayeff B Stables.

The 11-year-old Tizamazing was unraced but has produced quality from the start. Her first foal is the Distorted Humor colt What Now, a winner of $96,210; her second is stakes winner Awesome Patriot, a full brother to Oxbow; and the Preakness winner is the mare’s third offspring.

Tizamazing has a 2-year-old full brother to Oxbow named Expect a Lot, a dark bay yearling filly by Speightstown, and a colt of 2013 by Unbridled’s Song.

Oxbow and his siblings were bred in Kentucky by Rich Santulli’s Colts Neck Stables. Santulli, one of the smartest businessmen ever to look through a bridle, founded NetJets, the fractional-interest aircraft company, and is one of the most successful breeders and racers of Thoroughbreds in America.

And like a really practical businessman, Santulli sells some of his nicest prospects every year. Oxbow was one of those, and he brought $250,000 at the Keeneland September sale in 2011. Consigned by Lyn Burleson, agent for Colts Neck, the colt sold to Eddie Kane, agent for owner Brad Kelley’s Bluegrass Hall. Kane is the farm manager for Kelley’s Thoroughbred properties, which include the famed Calumet Farm outside Lexington.

Kelley took over operation of Calumet only last year, and one of the signal changes he has made is to place stallions at the historic farm that once stood such breed-shaping sires as Bull Lea. The current leader of the Calumet stallion roster is Melbourne Cup winner Americain (Dynaformer), but it is easy to see that he will be joined by additional premium performers when Oxbow and others are retired to stud.

The first time I saw Malibu Moon was at the Pons family’s Country Life Farm in Maryland in the fall of 1999, just before the colt entered stud the following year.

There was not much to know about the young horse, a winner and second in his only two starts as a juvenile, but he clearly had a first-rate pedigree. And in person, Malibu Moon (by A. P. Indy) was even more impressive. Tall, scopey, strong, and blessed with considerable bone, Malibu Moon was a fine specimen, and it was easy to see the attractions that brought him to stud, even with a minimal race record.

More than a decade later, Malibu Moon is a household name for those of us with an interest in racing and breeding, and the stallion stood at Spendthrift Farm in 2013 for a fee of $70,000 live foal for owner-breeder Wayne Hughes.

If one wanted to criticize the stallion, the hole in his sire record was the absence of a classic-winning colt. And then Orb filled the blank with a flourish in the Kentucky Derby. The bay colt will next carry the Janney family’s red and white silks in this Saturday’s Preakness as he attempts to win the second jewel of the Triple Crown for Janney and the Phipps Stable.

Should Orb succeed at Pimlico, he will attempt to complete the elusive triple, and there he will meet another son of Malibu Moon, Freedom Child. The latter won the Grade 2 Peter Pan Stakes at Belmont Park on Saturday by 13 1/4 lengths in the time of 1:49.09 on a sloppy racetrack, and he will be one entry given due consideration in three and a half weeks when the final classic is run.

Bred in Kentucky by Spendthrift Farm, Freedom Child went to the Saratoga select yearling sale in New York conducted by Fasig-Tipton two years ago and brought a final bid of $350,000 from St Elias Stable and West Point Thoroughbreds, with Spendthrift retaining a percentage of the colt.

Spendthrift Farm’s general manager Ned Toffey said, “We own a third of the horse. He was a really big, obvious-looking sort of yearling. He is correct, had a big, easy walk. We thought he would do well as a sales yearling and then were able to stay in for a piece. To their credit, West Point gave him plenty of time because he was a big, growthy colt. He was probably at the training center a little later and finished later than some horses.”

Good size and growthiness is not uncommon among the A. P. Indy-line stock, and Freedom Child got some of that from the other side of his pedigree too.

The dam of the Peter Pan winner is the 10-year-old Deputy Minister mare Bandstand. A winner in one of her 10 starts on the racetrack, Bandstand sold to Spendthrift for $520,000 (pre-depression bucks) at the 2007 Keeneland November sale. The mare was carrying her first foal to a cover by the Unbridled stallion Eddington, and Freedom Child is the mare’s third foal, third winner, and first stakes winner.

Toffey said, “We bought her based primarily on her pedigree and her looks. She is good-looking and is a good-sized mare with length. We’ve been pleased with the foals she’s produced, and Freedom Child has combined those looks with graded stakes success.

“We bought her carrying Eddie’s Band (Eddington). He looked to have a world of ability, and we saw the horse work bullet after bullet, but that hasn’t translated into much success,” with a single win from 16 starts to date.

Freedom Child was a May 18 foal, and Bandstand did not have a foal the following year. Toffey said, “You wouldn’t normally take a May foal to Saratoga, but that tells you what sort of individual he was. The yearling full sister is really nice, but we haven’t decided what to do with her yet.” The mare has a yearling bay filly by Malibu Moon and is carrying her 2013 foal on a cover to Tizway (Tiznow). “She would be bred to Malibu Moon, although we might just end up waiting till next year because she is a mare who tends to go long on her pregnancies,” Toffey said.

Bandstand is out of Grade 1 winner City Band, one of the very best racing daughters of the important stallion Carson City (Mr. Prospector). Showing her best form at two, City Band won the G1 Oak Leaf Stakes and G3 Golden Rod, and then finished second in the G1 Hollywood Starlet in 1996. As a broodmare for Overbrook Farm, City Band produced stakes winners Weather Warning (Storm Cat) and Foolishly (Broad Brush) and is the second dam of G3 winner American Lion (Tiznow), who is at stud in Kentucky at Darby Dan Farm.

On Kentucky Derby day, no sun shined brightly. Instead, it was a dark and rainy day, but there was an Orb who shined nonetheless. That was a dark bay colt gleaming with water and streaked with mud from the sloppy Churchill Downs surface.

The fire within that lit the Derby winner’s eyes, that powered the remarkable stroke of his stride, is part of a legacy from his famed forebears, which include classic winners A.P. Indy (Belmont Stakes) and Unbridled (Kentucky Derby).

The Derby winner’s pedigree is part of a long history of dedication to Thoroughbred breeding and racing that can be read in the Paulick Report’s owner-breeder story. It is part of the breeders’ continuing search to find the best bloodstock and breed the best racehorses.

Part of that tradition is Claiborne Farm, which has raised Thoroughbreds for the Phippses and Janneys for decades. Claiborne also stood Bold Reasoning, a grandson of the Phipps family’s great stallion Bold Ruler. In the first year of his brief career at stud, Bold Reasoning became the sire of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew, the sire of Horse of the Year A.P. Indy, who was bred by Will Farish in partnership and stood his entire stud career at Farish’s Lane’s End Farm, where the grand old stallion still resides.

Now pensioned, A.P. Indy has proven a landmark stallion, both because of his individual accomplishments as a sire and because he has been a major force in reviving Claiborne’s greatest male line of Nasrullah and Bold Ruler and putting it again on the pinnacle of American breeding.

With Princess of Sylmar winning the Kentucky Oaks on Friday and Orb succeeding in the Derby, the A.P. Indy male line won both classics. This is the glittering hallmark of quality that has made the A.P. Indy male line the preeminent source of classic ability in North America.

The sire of Princess of Sylmar is Coolmore’s Majestic Warrior, a son of A.P. Indy whose first foals are 3 and who stands at the operation’s Ashford Stud outside Versailles, Ky. The Kentucky Derby winner is by Malibu Moon, a thoroughly proven son of A.P. Indy who stands at Wayne Hughes’ Spendthrift Farm north of Lexington.

Bred and raced by Hughes, Malibu Moon showed exceptional speed and precocity, winning a 5-furlong maiden special before injury sent him into retirement. He had shown such speed that he found a spot at stud in Maryland at the Pons family’s Country Life Farm. After the success of his first two crops to race, including champion juvenile Declan’s Moon, Malibu Moon moved to Kentucky, and his star has risen year after year.

Ned Toffey, general manager of Spendthrift, noted that the high class and natural ability of the stock by Malibu Moon have continued to elevate the stallion’s status, crop after crop, and the stallion’s stud fee has risen in similar fashion. From 11 crops of racing age, Malibu Moon has 67 stakes winners to date.

This season, Malibu Moon has a book of about 150 mares, and one of them is Lady Liberty, the dam of Orb, and a daughter of Unbridled.

Toffey said, “I like the mating that produced Orb because it incorporates some of the suggestions that I’ve made to breeders, that they look to add scope and try to lighten up the resulting foal. That’s what I see in Orb. He’s a good-sized, strong horse, but he’s not what I’d call heavy.”

In physical type, Orb clearly takes a good deal from his dam and her celebrated sire Unbridled, a truly big horse with tremendous scope and bone. He was a stakes winner at 2, then improved out of sight at 3 under the handling of trainer Carl Nafzger, winning the Kentucky Derby, finishing second to Summer Squall in the Preakness, and winning the Breeders’ Cup Classic in the fall.

As a stallion, Unbridled exceeded even what he proved on the racetrack.

At stud, Unbridled sired the winners of all three Triple Crown races: Grindstone (Kentucky Derby), Red Bullet (Preakness), and Empire Maker (Belmont Stakes). The stallion also sired winners of many other G1 races, including multiple Breeders’ Cup victors, and now, as the broodmare sire of Orb, Unbridled has added a second classic to add to Preakness victory by Shackleford (by Forestry out of the Unbridled mare Oatsee).

Unbridled, representing a strain of Mr. Prospector that is essentially classic, is out of a mare by the important French-bred stallion Le Fabuleux. After early success at stud in France, Le Fabuleux was imported to Kentucky to stand at Claiborne in the 1960s by A.B. “Bull” Hancock Jr., and one of the shareholders in that syndicate and consistent supporters of the stallion was Ogden Phipps, the father of Orb’s co-breeder and -owner, Dinny Phipps.

Among the most successful breeders to use Le Fabuleux was Tartan Farms, which bred Unbridled and sold him at the Tartan Farms dispersal to Frances Genter, who raced the colt, then retired him to stud at Gainesway Farm.

When Unbridled hit the brass ring with a first crop that included Kentucky Derby winner Grindstone and major winner and sire Unbridled’s Song, overseas interests came calling with the intent to purchase and potentially export Unbridled.

A group led by Rich Santulli thwarted that effort, buying a controlling interest in the horse and sending him to spend the rest of his career at Claiborne, where he sired Lady Liberty, the dam of Orb.

With his performance last Saturday, Orb glittered with a hard, gem-like flame that reflected the time, tradition, and generations of commitment that produced him.

One advantage that home breeders have in the selection of stock is that they can make themselves aware of subtleties in stock that are meaningful and can disregard things that are not.

For Emory Alexander Hamilton, who bred and sold the unbeaten Kentucky Derby prospect Verrazano, knowledge of one of her family’s King Ranch Thoroughbred lines led her to purchase a landmark mare that has shaped Hamilton’s breeding program for three decades.

In a recent interview, Hamilton recalled that her sister, Helen Alexander, “had taken over the management of the King Ranch Thoroughbreds after our grandfather died. She sold some colts, and in 1980, she also included fillies in the King Ranch consignment.”

Among those fillies was an elegant bay by French highweight Blushing Groom and the second foal out of the talented Dr. Fager mare Remedia, a daughter of French classic winner Monade.

The yearling filly was Too Chic, and Hamilton purchased her at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky July sale of selected yearlings for $100,000. At the time, Blushing Groom was a well-regarded but unproven sire, and the filly wasn’t perfect in front.

Hamilton said that Too Chic “didn’t move that well in front, but she was a good walker, and Tom Cooper of the BBA (Ireland) agreed to buy her for me as a friend.”

Going against the grain of the hyper-critical marketplace, Hamilton wanted to buy high-class stock. She said, “Her crookedness didn’t bother me. She was a pretty nice filly” for scope and quality, “and Monade was that way too and was good-sized.”

Having secured a filly who would prove a more potent foundation mare than others who would cost much more in the sales ring, Hamilton did right by the filly to let her show her class on the racetrack by giving her time and sending her to the proper sort of trainer.

Hamilton said that “Tom Cooper persuaded me to be patient with Too Chic and put me with trainer Jim Maloney. That worked out pretty well.”

Yes, indeed. Making her début at 3, Too Chic won four of her eight starts, including the Grade 1 Maskette Stakes, and placed second in two stakes, including the G1 Alabama over 10 furlongs at Saratoga.

Retired to stud, Too Chic was sent to the important young sire Mr. Prospector and produced a pair of G1 winners in Chic Shirine and champion Queena.

That makes breeding good racehorses seem simple, doesn’t it?

Chic Shirine emulated her dam by winning a G1, the Ashland, at 3 and running third in the G1 Mother Goose. And her younger full sister won three times at the premium level during her championship season at 5.

At stud, Chic Shirine produced a pair of G2 stakes winners, Tara Roma and Waldoboro, both by leading sire Lyphard (Northern Dancer). The mare’s last foal was by Northern Dancer’s great-grandson Giant’s Causeway, and she is named Enchanted Rock.

Hamilton said that Enchanted Rock, the dam of Verrazano, “is a very big mare, standing about 17.1. Shug had her, ran her one time, and she got hurt. So we bred her to Pulpit because he was proven, had good speed, and was smaller, thinking to go against size because we didn’t want anything bigger.”

After breeding four generations of this family, Hamilton knows her stock, and her first result from Enchanted Rock was graded stakes winner El Padrino.

The second was Verrazano (More Than Ready), now a G1 winner and one of the chief favorites for the Kentucky Derby.

Hamilton noted that Verrazano is a “good-sized More Than Ready and was a good-looking colt” when sent to the yearling sales at Keeneland in September of 2011, where the bay brought $250,000 from Let’s Go Stable.

Hamilton “generally sells the colts and keeps the fillies” from her broodmares, and that is the pattern she followed with Enchanted Rock’s first three foals. The first two are El Padrino and Verrazano, and the third is the Tapit filly La Madrina that Hamilton has in training with Shug McGaughey as a 2-year-old.

As all the world and especially those closely associated with the Kentucky Derby contenders watch them train at Churchill Downs this week, Hamilton noted that, “Enchanted Rock’s babies have very good minds. They don’t get worked up like some.”

That might be an observation to remember about a colt who will experience the most exciting 30 minutes of a racehorse’s life just before he competes in the most exciting two minutes in sports.

With the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby less than two weeks away, the Coolmore Lexington Stakes at Keeneland and Illinois Derby at Hawthorne were essentially the final two preps for classic colts, especially since trainers apparently can no longer prepare a colt for the Derby on less than two weeks’ rest.

What would the great trainer Ben Jones think about this puzzle of highly trained and lightly raced colts?

All the thinkage may be moot, however, because neither winner of the weekend preps is likely to start in the classic at Churchill Downs.

The Lexington Stakes winner, Winning Cause (by Giant’s Causeway), is trained by Todd Pletcher, who already has five colts confirmed for the first classic (the highly rated and unbeaten Verrazano, as well as Revolutionary, Overanalyze, Palace Malice, and Charming Kitten). Pletcher noted after the race that Winning Cause had been entered for the Lexington because he had raced so well at Keeneland before, not because the connections were gunning for points to make the classic.

If the Giant’s Causeway colt, now a winner in three of his seven starts, challenges for a Triple Crown race, it is more likely to be the Preakness, two weeks after the Derby and four weeks from the Lexington.

That race is also a possible target for Illinois Derby winner Departing (War Front). Although a winner in four of his five starts, Departing doesn’t have sufficient points to be in the top 20 among prospective Kentucky Derby starters, even if his seasoning suggested that he would benefit from the experience.

So few colts actually come out of the Derby better than they went in that the horsemen overseeing Departing’s development are more likely to choose a conservative course that will offer the gelded bay son of War Front the time to develop and show his ability through the season.

Bred in Kentucky by co-owners Adele Dilschneider and Claiborne Farm (Departing races in the Claiborne colors), the son of War Front is the third foal of the Pulpit mare Leave. Unplaced in her only start, Leave is a full sister to Laity, winner of the Cradle Stakes and the John Battaglia Memorial. The mare is also a half-sister to the highly accomplished stakes winner Trip (Lord at War), who won a trio of G3 stakes and $888,773, and to the speedy stakes winner Joke (Phone Trick), who is also the dam of freshman sire Zensational.

Leave and her siblings are out of the stakes-winning Forty Niner mare Tour, and she is one of three stakes winners out of the Full Pocket mare Fun Flight, a stakes winner herself. This is a family known for its speed and quality, and Departing represents another generation of its success at Claiborne.

The first two foals out of Leave are solid winners by Claiborne stallion Arch, but Departing is a major step up in class from his siblings. A winner of his début on Dec. 22, Departing bowled over his opponents for his next condition with victory in a Feb. 1 allowance, both races at Fair Grounds racetrack in New Orléans. Departing became a stakes winner in his third start, the Texas Heritage Stakes at Sam Houston over a mile on March 2.

The gelding’s only loss to date was a third in the Louisiana Derby, and after four victories in five races, Departing’s earnings now total $628,000.

The Illinois Derby winner is by the Claiborne stallion War Front, a son of the great sire Danzig. War Front had a good weekend, when Departing ran successfully in Illinois and the year-older Summer Front won the Miami Mile at Calder.

The 11-year-old stallion has 20 stakes winners to date. A winner of the Alfred Vanderbilt and second in the Vosburgh, Forego, and Tom Fool, War Front had impressive speed. That is the signal quality of his offspring, allied with an enthusiasm for racing and class.

Speed and class such as that seen in the stallion’s sons The Factor and Soldat, and now in Departing, have made War Front one of the most prominent young stallions, and his offspring are in high demand, just like seasons to the stallions, who now stands for $80,000 live foal and is receiving stronger books of mares each year.

Victory in Saturday’s Toyota Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland made Java’s War the first Grade 1 winner from the progeny of 2007 champion juvenile War Pass (by Cherokee Run). The Blue Grass winner joins G2 Louisiana Derby winner Revolutionary as hot prospects by their sire for the upcoming Triple Crown, with the Kentucky Derby being run the first Saturday in May.

Revolutionary and Java’s War are the two best racers by their sire, who unfortunately died after only two seasons at stud in Kentucky at Lane’s End Farm. The previously named colts were only weanlings when War Pass died of unknown causes after being turned out in his paddock on Dec. 24, 2010.

With his abrupt loss, the prospects of War Pass leaving an important mark on the breed seemed remote, but already the stallion’s two most prominent sons are ensuring a measure of respect and recognition for War Pass that may someday equal his fame as a racehorse.

On the track, War Pass was an exceptional performer. He was unbeaten at 2, winning both the G1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and Champagne Stakes. War Pass was unquestionably the best colt of his crop at 2, with great strength and early maturity, but he failed to train on at 3, with his best effort from three starts being a second in the G1 Wood Memorial to Tale of Ekati, a colt owned and bred by Charles Fipke, who bred and races Java’s War.

War Pass had been a very good sales yearling, going for $180,000 at the 2006 Keeneland September sale out of the Claiborne Farm consignment. Bred by Cherry Valley Farm, War Pass was out of the Mr. Prospector mare Vue and was a half-brother to G1 winner Oath (Known Fact).

Trainer Nick Zito helped to select the colt for buyer Robert LaPenta, who raced the colt through his unbeaten juvenile season before syndicating him for stud.

War Pass entered stud at Lane’s End for the 2009 season for $30,000 live foal and had 63 reported foals from that crop. He covered 83 mares in his second year, standing for $20,000 in a rapidly declining economy, and had 61 foals that are now 2-year-olds.

By War Pass out of a mare by Rainbow Quest, Java’s War is linebred to Blushing Groom through the male line and broodmare sire line. That is both intriguing and potentially unimportant. It’s intriguing because this line in generally in abeyance in the States and worldwide; yet here it is doubly represented in this obviously good-class racer.

While Nashwan was Blushing Groom’s best racing son in Europe, although perhaps by a narrower margin than the headlines for that classic winner might suggest, Rainbow Quest was his sire’s best stallion son across the pond. Elsewhere, Runaway Groom, Rahy, and Mt. Livermore were the most prominent stallion sons in the States, with Candy Stripes taking the limelight in South America.

The linebreeding may not be of too great importance because Java’s War, from all the evidence of his racing performance, is much more a Rainbow Quest than a Blushing Groom.

In the Blue Grass, Java’s War has turned in his best performance at nine furlongs, the longest distance he has yet raced, won at the G1 level on a synthetic surface that usually suits closing horses, and shows every evidence of being a maturing colt who should improve further.

The colt’s racing style and success are thrilling to owner-breeder Charles Fipke, who purchased Java, the dam of Java’s War, for $350,000 from the Lane’s End consignment at the 2009 Keeneland November breeding stock sale. The colt was born the following spring on May 4, and Java’s War will be 3 by the calendar on Derby Day.

Fipke, a serious student of the logic of pedigrees, said at the Blue Grass post-race interview that the rationale for the mating that produced Java’s War was crossing the early speed of champion War Pass onto the classic potential of a Rainbow Quest mare.

The English-bred Java was not an average Rainbow Quest mare. Only a winner on the track, Java is a full sister to the high-class racemare Fiji, who had sold for $3.1 million as an 8-year-old in foal to Danehill in 2002, then resold in foal to Hard Spun as a 14-year-old in 2010 for $110,000 to Bluegrass Hall.

This is a robust family of good performers that have shown their best form on turf racing a mile or more. Java’s War should write further chapters in their saga.

Now unbeaten in four races, Verrazano made himself one of the chief favorites for the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby with his victory in the Wood Memorial over the Tapit colt Normandy Invasion.

Those two, along with Florida Derby winner Orb, Santa Anita Derby winner Goldencents, and a couple more who will be rising to the occasion in the next week or two, figure to make up the top half-dozen selections for the Run for the Roses on the first Saturday in May.

Verrazano was bred in Kentucky by Emory Alexander Hamilton and raised at Helen Alexander’s Middlebrook Farm on Old Frankfort Pike, where Hamilton keeps all her mares.

Middlebrook is home to most of the broodmares from this family, descending from the French highweight and classic winner Monade, whom Robert J. Kleberg Jr. purchased and imported in the early 1960s. (For more on the history of this importation, see the previous column here.)

Much of the success of this line, including champion Queena, G1 winners Too Chic and Brahms, and other high-quality performers, has come from grafting classic-quality speed horses onto this robustly classic line. Among the sires used successfully with the Monade family have been Horse of the Year Dr. Fager, French classic winner Blushing Groom, and the great sires Mr. Prospector and Danzig.

The dam of Verrazano, Enchanted Rock (by Giant’s Causeway), was one of the exceptions to racing success in the family. She was unplaced in her only start, but she has begun her career the right way.

Both of the mare’s first two foals of racing age are graded stakes winners: G2 winner El Padrino (Pulpit) and now Verrazano.

Enchanted Rock’s 2-year-old is a filly by leading sire Tapit, and the mare has a yearling filly by Pulpit who is a full sister to El Padrino. On April 3, Enchanted Rock produced a chestnut colt by Pulpit, and the mare is booked to return to More Than Ready, the sire of Verrazano.

A 16-year-old son of the supreme South American sire Southern Halo, More Than Ready was a high-class 2-year-old in 1999, when he won four stakes while showing more speed and precocity than stamina. The colt returned the following season to win at the G1 level with a success in the King’s Bishop at Saratoga and also placed second in the G1 Blue Grass and G1 Vosburgh.

More Than Ready had better precocity and a higher turn of speed than most of this male line coming from the Hail to Reason stallion Halo through Southern Halo. More Than Ready also offered an outcross, but the stallion had to earn his way into the good graces of many breeders, as this line was not and still is not overly strong in North America.

In South America, Southern Halo and his sons get champion juveniles and 10-furlong classic winners, along with much of everything between. And in Australia, where More Than Ready began shuttling several years ago, the stallion has earned an even higher ranking among breeders than he enjoys in the States.

As evidence of this, the stallion’s stud fee of $121,000 ($Aus, including tax) in Australia is quite a bit higher than his Kentucky fee of $60,000 live foal.

More Than Ready earned his success with consistency and quality, and he has managed to show consistency, even though he entered stud in the era of over-large books. From more than 2,000 foals worldwide, the stallion has 118 stakes winners at present.

Verrazano is the 13th G1 winner for his sire, and given mares with scope and strength and more stamina in the family, More Than Ready is showing the capacity to get high-class performers across a variety of distances and surfaces in North American, and as his successes build, so do the quality of his mates.

When Enchanted Rock first went to More Than Ready, she was an unproven mare with a good family and potential. Now, she will be one of the stars of the stallion’s 2013 book, and some canny observers of racing form believe that the mating will look even better after the first Saturday in May.

A multi-year leading national sire, Smart Strike sires a wide variety of excellent athletes, such as the top sprinter Fabulous Strike, the champion turf performer English Channel, champion juveniles Lookin at Lucky and My Miss Aurelia, and Horse of the Year Curlin.

Several of Smart Strike’s top performers have shown their best form when given time and sometimes a good deal of distance, but the successful son of the great sire Mr. Prospector is also the sire this year of the most expensive 2-year-old sold in training.

That big performer in the sales ring was the gray colt who topped the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company’s auction week before last at $1.8 million. The leading sales colt was from a prominent family developed by the leading breeder Edward ‘Ned’ Evans and sold initially at the dispersal of stock from the Evans estate.

The first is a filly out of the unraced Unbridled’s Song mare Music Room, a half-sister to the smashing performers Music Note (by A.P. Indy), winner of the Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks, Mother Goose, Gazelle, and Beldame Stakes; and Musical Chimes (In Excess), winner of the G1 French 1,000 Guineas and John Mabee Handicap. The filly’s third dam is champion It’s in the Air (Mr. Prospector), and this filly is inbred to the landmark sire Mr. Prospector 2x5x4.

Hip 71 is a chestnut colt who is the first foal out of the Rahy mare Tejida, a winner of more than a quarter-million dollars who ran second or third in the Bewitch, The Very One, Doubledogdare, Gallorette, and All Along, all G3 stakes named for famous racemares. This colt’s second dam is the multiple G3 winner Batique, a daughter of Storm Cat.

As a leading sire, Smart Strike has earned excellent books of mares with deep pedigrees, as the preceding pair of yearlings indicate. The stallion’s best books of mares have come in his latter years as the 21-year-old stallion has continued to succeed at a high level. Smart Strike was sired when Mr. Prospector was 22, and this is a sire line that continues producing premium individuals at a very late age.

Although Smart Strike is the last-surviving son of Mr. Prospector at the top of the stud fee list ($85,000 live foal), there are also Not for Love ($15,000), Kentucky Derby winner Fusaichi Pegasus ($7,500), and major winner E Dubai ($7,500), who sired Fort Larned, winner of last year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic.