galileo could add a different dimension to american breeding

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galileo, northern dancer, saratoga sale

The following note was published on the second day of the Saratoga select yearling sale last week.

The Northern Dancer line in North America is much thinner than a generation ago. Although Danzig’s son War Front appears a bright star on the horizon, Storm Cat was the line’s great hope for a continued dominance here in the States through that stallion’s speed and versatility, but he is gone now, and only a couple of his sons, Giant’s Causeway and Tale of the Cat, are left to carry on at the top level.

How different is the story in Europe!

Northern Dancer is not just all the rage. He is all the breed.

Mighty Sadler’s Wells led the sires’ tables abroad for a generation, and other members of the Northern Dancer line filled the minor spots in the racing program and leader boards over the years to a rather alarming degree.

But instead of fading away, as is the norm with stallion lines, Sadler’s Wells sired a pair of sons who have emerged over the past several years as eminent successors to his legacy. While one of these, Arc de Triomphe winner Montjeu, is lamentably dead too soon, the other is Galileo.

The best sire in Europe, and very probably the best sire in the world, Galileo is moreover a genuine Northern Dancer type.

Racing men could argue about the type of horse sired by Storm Cat. The Storm Cat type tended to be heavier than that of his grandsire, as well as typically less suited to racing past eight or nine furlongs. The Montjeus were big classic types, even rangy, and possessed of an enthusiasm and inner character that sometimes exceeded the patience of their handlers. 

But the Galileos are just right. They tend to be beautifully balanced, quick-actioned, and strong. They also frequently possess the willingness to rate and to use their ability to quicken when it will do them the most good. And win more races. 

This year alone, Galileo has out three classic winners, including the winners of both the English Derby and its French equivalent, the Prix du Jockey Club.

Unfortunately, we see very few Galileos in the States. But a pair of fillies are in the Saratoga select yearling sale as Hips 44 and 129.

Both are Irish-bred fillies born early in the year and are out of élite mares. Hip 44 is a Jan. 15 foal out of the French classic winner Elusive Wave (Elusive City), and Hip 129 is a Feb. 15 foal out of a Storm Cat mare who has produced three stakes horses. The best of those is G1 winner Magnificent Song (Unbridled’s Song), and the two others are group stakes-placed.

Let’s hope these fillies encourage a trend of bringing over more and more of the offspring of this splendid sire so that our racing and breeding can be replenished with this excellent line of Thoroughbreds from Northern Dancer.

[Note: Both fillies were, by the standards of the super-select yearling market, rather immature. That may be fairly typical among the Galileos, since they make such good 3-year-olds. Hip 44 was unsold from the Paramount Sales consignment at $345,000, and Hip 192 sold out of Eaton Sales, agent, for $600,000 to Spendthrift Farm.]

 

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galileo and famous sire sadler’s wells are rulers of the bloodstock world

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epsom derby, galileo, ruler of the world, sadler's wells, sires of stallions

The following post first appeared earlier this week at Paulick Report.

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.

new kentucky stallions for 2012: cape blanco

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ashford stud, cape blanco, galileo, new kentucky stallions of 2012, sire lines

This is part of a series of profiles of horses who entered stud in Kentucky for the 2012 breeding season. The profiles will be linked to the page listing this group in its entirety.

Cape Blanco (2007 ch h by Galileo x Laurel Delight, by Presidium) Ashford $17,500

My first response to Cape Blanco was to his presence and scope. He is a robust, lengthy specimen who stood a shade over 16 hands when I inspected him. The big chestnut possesses plenty of substance through the girth, taping more than 77 inches around, and he has the robust bone and sinew one associates with a tough horse capable of campaigning for several seasons, which Cape Blanco did.

A good-sized, rangy chestnut, Cape Blanco proved the most popular stallion in the country in 2012 by the number of mares bred to him. The son of leading international sire Galileo covered 220 mares this season in Kentucky.
 
Galileo, the most popular stallion son of the great sire Sadler’s Wells, stands at Coolmore in Ireland, and Coolmore’s American stud, Ashford, is the Northern Hemisphere base for Cape Blanco.
 
Ashford regularly produces some of the highest covering figures in the States, and in 2012, five of the seven stallions who covered the most mares stood at the farm. Following Cape Blanco were Scat Daddy (217) in second, Uncle Mo (211) in fourth, Majestic Warrior (167) in sixth, and Giant’s Causeway (166) in seventh. Kitten’s Joy (213) and Wilburn (169) were the only non-Ashford stallions in the leading seven.

In addition to his good looks and famous sire, Cape Blanco attracted mares because of his athletic prowess. The winner of nine races from 15 starts and more than $3.8 million, Cape Blanco won the Irish Derby and Irish Champion Stakes at 3, when he was the highweighted colt in Ireland.
 
The following season, Cape Blanco won the G1 Arlington Million, Man o’ War, and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Stakes in the U.S. That’s a very good race record and earned him an Eclipse Award as outstanding grass male, but under typical circumstances, breeders would stare at Cape Blanco’s record and say, “Can’t use him. He’s a turf horse.”
 
That did not happen with Cape Blanco.
 
In part, that is testament to the power of Coolmore as a kingmaker in the stallion business. But also, there is a rising tide surrounding Coolmore’s star sire Galileo. Not only is Galileo an outstanding stallion represented by the world’s leading racehorse, Frankel, but Galileo also is proving himself a sire of sires.
 
Breeders were well ahead of the curve on this. And this year, although long after the covering season began here, the first top sons of Galileo at stud have proven their mettle as sires in Europe. Galileo’s English Derby winner New Approach has a slew of stakes horses racing from his first crop of 2-year-olds, and the second-crop sire Teofilo has group stakes horses performing from his first 3-year-olds.
 
Cape Blanco’s first foals will arrive in 2013, and two mares (Hips 12 and 164) in foal to him are in the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky November catalog. The first mare, A Mind of Her Own, brought $85,000, and the second, Sweetlalabye, sold for $22,000.

frankel finishes racing and will be the most important new stallion of 2013

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champion stakes, frankel, galileo, henry cecil, juddmonte farms, new stallions for 2013

The following post first appeared earlier this week at Paulick Report.

Fast, fearsome, and freakishly talented, Frankel has been retired. The champion of his age for three seasons running and generally acknowledged the best horse in the world for the last two, the powerful bay son of Galileo takes extraordinary credentials with him to stud.
 
Frankel is unbeaten in 14 starts, including 10 Group 1 races, but more important than his perfect record is the colt’s utter dominance of his contemporaries. None could touch him, and some of them, notably Cirrus Des Aigles, Nathaniel, St Nicholas Abbey, Canford Cliffs, and Excelebration, showed excellent form at the top level when not encumbered by chasing Frankel.

As a son of the best stallion in the world, Galileo, Frankel also is following the crest of a rising wave, as the first serious stallion sons of Galileo have had runners the past two seasons, and they include leading sires New Approach (freshman) and Teofilo (first crop now 3). Sons of Galileo are making the grade early, both with 2-year-olds and with their classic-age stock (Teofilo), and at this point, this pair of young stallions make Galileo look like a stronger sire of stallions than his own sire Sadler’s Wells.
 
In addition to the bloodline bonus points for his amazing sire, Frankel is out a mare who has spent her time in the paddocks as productively as a broodmare possibly could. His dam, Kind, is a daughter of the good sire and broodmare sire Danehill, and she has three stakes winners from her first three foals.
 
Only one of them is Frankel, but the champion’s older half-brother Bullet Train is famously known as the “only horse who can live with Frankel on the gallops,” according to trainer Henry Cecil.

So, if it seems that Frankel is the perfect horse, he is very nearly that rare gem. But even among the glittering qualities of the champion with so much obvious talent, there was one potential flaw. The colt was inclined to get overheated. It was, the trainer and jockey and racing manager for Juddmonte all concurred, not a fault of character. Frankel loved his sport rather too much.
 
Frankel is a good-feeling horse, with the exuberance and enthusiasm to race and feel the wind in his ears, to a fault. He is rather like a vintage champagne, which if opened tenderly will surrender trails of sparkling bubbles that break gently at the brim. But if shaken up, Frankel could easily have exploded and become a tear-away without the tractability and clear-headed resolution of a great champion.
 
A great trainer long before Frankel was born, Cecil showed the depth of his skills with his development of Frankel, and the horse has responded throughout his career, improving and then improving further. Frankel now stands among the supreme champions of the breed throughout history, and fans and historians of the sport will while away winter evenings with discussion of the merits of their favorite champions.
 
Among the greatest racers of the last 60 or so years, Frankel is most commonly mentioned alongside the great Italian-bred racer Ribot (unbeaten), the French-bred star Sea-Bird (once-beaten), the English-bred Brigadier Gerard (once-beaten), and the U.S.-bred Secretariat (thrice-beaten, plus one to the stewards). All had tremendous natural ability, which they showed on the international stage, and they went to stud with great interest from breeders and racing fans worldwide.
 
Of this group, only Secretariat went to stud with expectations as great as those for Frankel, and the son of Bold Ruler provides a positive parallel to the English-bred champion Frankel. Secretariat was the best racing son of the greatest stallion of his time and was out of an outstanding broodmare who had already produced a son, Sir Gaylord, who proved a top-class racer and good sire.
 
Unlike Secretariat, however, Frankel will not be syndicated. He will remain wholly owned by one of the most knowledgeable and successful breeders in the world, Khalid Abdullah, who will stand the colt at Banstead Manor in Newmarket. Owner of some of the best producers in the world, Juddmonte will send a large group of them to their homebred champion.
 
Nearly every breeder of consequence would like to send a mare to Frankel, and as a result, the demand will far exceed the supply of seasons to the horse. As surely as the sun will rise, Juddmonte will set a very robust stud fee for Frankel, partly as a means of self-limiting the number of applications for seasons.
 
A high stud fee will encourage the breeders who can afford it to send only their most select mares, and those most certain to patronize the stallion include prominent international breeders like Darley, Coolmore, the Aga Khan, Wertheimer et Frere, the Wildenstein family, the Niarchos family, and other premier breeders of bloodstock.
 
Another point of interest is that the majority of this list is populated with home breeders. This is a gentle difference to the trend of breeding in America, where Frankel would have been more strongly patronized by commercial breeders.
 
Nor is Frankel likely to serve an oversized book of mares or to shuttle to the Southern Hemisphere and cover a vast number of mares annually. Instead, Frankel primarily will be siring foals for breeders’ racing stables, not commercial yearlings, and he will be siring a more restricted number of foals than has been common with stallions owned by Coolmore or Darley.
 
Naturally, the Frankel yearlings who do go to the sales will attract intense interest and will command high prices.

frankel is our leading exemplar for speed with classic potential

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ascot racecourse, bobby frankel, british champions day, coolmore stud, frankel, galileo, henry cecil, international sire power, juddmonte farms, khalid abdullah, leading sires, maturity in the racehorse, montjeu, northern dancer, omnipresent pedigree factors, queen elizabeth stakes, racing style and tactics. leading racehorses, sadler's wells branch of northern dancer, tom queally, world class racehorse

The following post appeared earlier this week at Paulick Report.

Frankel provided yet another sparkling example of his immense racing ability with an impressive victory in the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on British Champions Day at Ascot racecourse on Saturday. Following the lead of his half-brother Bullet Train (by Sadler’s Wells), Frankel showed his greatest maturity and poise in waiting till jockey Tom Queally gave him a nudge. Then the mighty champion filleted his opposition with a furlong in 10 seconds and change, and from that point onward, it was a matter of maintaining the colt’s balance and focus to the wire.

Owned by Khalid Abdullah and bred by him in the name of Juddmonte Farms, Frankel is named in honor of the great trainer Bobby Frankel, and his namesake is setting standards for excellence and character that would make the late trainer proud. Earlier in the year, and even more so last season, Frankel was a “tricky ride,” according to his jockey and trainer. In large part, this difficulty was due to the colt’s high cruising speed, which his contemporaries could not live with, but which nonetheless seemed a potential chink in the colt’s armor if he became a confirmed front-runner.

Such behavior would have made Frankel an easy victim of forcing tactics from large stables loaded with “rabbits” to take him on early and wear him out for late-charging stablemates. Through careful handling and training, Frankel has matured into a racehorse who can be positioned for his own tactical benefit. All of this is great news for Frankel’s future and continuing bad news for his hapless opponents.

Not only was Frankel leading juvenile colt last season, but he also claims the same distinction among his age group this year. Furthermore, the dashing bay is considered the best horse in the world. Now that trainer Henry Cecil has said that testing the colt at 10 furlongs and racing somewhat farther afield lie ahead for Frankel’s 4-year-old season, there won’t even be the need to slightly qualify the colt’s ranking with the phrase “at a mile.”

Those challenges lie in the future, however, as the burly bay has finished his second season, now unbeaten in nine starts, and Frankel’s rampant success has pushed his sire Galileo’s leadership as the best of his sphere farther ahead of his active contemporaries at stud.

Galileo rules supreme at Coolmore Stud, which previously stood his all-conquering sire Sadler’s Wells, and Coolmore also stands the principal classic competitor to Galileo, the Sadler’s Wells stallion Montjeu. Is that an embarrassment of riches?

No. I think not.

Over the past 20 years, one of the considerations that breeders, whether Coolmore or anyone else, have had to finesse is the choice of mates for these most prominent sires of the Northern Dancer line. The grandsire of these two stallions is omnipresent among premium bloodstock around the world and is perhaps most concentrated in the Irish élite held by Coolmore and its clients.

As a result, most of the better progeny of Galileo and Montjeu are inbred to Northern Dancer. Both of Galileo’s G1 winners this weekend – Frankel and Together (winner of the Queen Elizabeth Challenge Cup at Keeneland) – are inbred to Northern Dancer. Likewise, the two daughters of Montjeu who won the G1 E.P. Taylor and Canadian International this weekend at Woodbine are inbred to the great bay.

Montjeu’s Sarah Lynx, winner of the Canadian International, is out of a Danehill mare, like Frankel. Danehill is grandson of Northern Dancer through Danzig. And in the case of Sarah Lynx, the 4-year-old’s second dam is the Caerleon mare Champaka. Caerleon is a classic winner by Northern Dancer’s son Nijinsky, winner of the English Triple Crown in 1970.

That gives Sarah Lynx three lines of Northern Dancer, and these repetitions are going to proliferate.

But do they mean anything?

Yes, they mean something, and the most immediately understandable thing they represent is the recurrence of high quality in the pedigree, especially the presence of speed with classic potential. This was the most important quality that Northern Dancer imparted to his descendants, and it was this great quality that set apart his sons and daughters as producers of succeeding generations.

In 2012, we get to see how far this excellence of bloodline, character, and speed will carry Frankel in his quest to join racing’s immortals.

el prado has a star filly in winter memories

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broodmare success, conformation and performance, el prado, galileo, garden city stakes, inheritance in the racehorse, john phillips, memories of silver, montjeu, phenotype and mating decisions, phillips racing partnership, physique of thoroughbreds, running style in the racehorse, sons of sadler's wells, stallion success, winter memories

The following article first appeared earlier this week in Paulick Report.

Before Galileo and before Montjeu, who are both classic winners and leading sires of classic winners, the sentiment of European breeders was drifting in the direction of calling Sadler’s Wells a disappointment as a sire of stallions. Such a judgment would have seemed harsh to American breeders, however, because we had the first son of Sadler’s Wells who was proving consistent and widely successful: El Prado.

Like his sire, El Prado was good from the beginning, and again like Sadler’s Wells, the gray stallion left some of his best work for late in his stallion career. Although he died in 2009 at age 20, El Prado has not one but two good sons at stud in Medaglia d’Oro and Kitten’s Joy, as well as several young sires with promise coming along, and El Prado has been having a solid year with his racing stock, as well, with eight stakes winners, five graded.

Just the weekend before last, the stallion’s son Grassy won the Grade 2 Bowling Green at Belmont, and on Saturday, his daughter Winter Memories first showed the courage to change direction late and then a powerful turn of foot to stride past a wall of horses for a victory in the Grade 1 Garden City at Belmont.

Breeder John Phillips, who owns the filly with his three sisters as Phillips Racing Partnership, said the filly’s finish was remarkably like the racing style of her mother, Memories of Silver, a winner twice at the G1 level during her illustrious racing career.

Phillips said that although “her running style is very similar to her mother’s, showing a tremendous ability to accelerate,” Winter Memories has some differences in physical makeup.

“Memories of Silver is a moderate-sized mare,” said Phillips, “standing 16 hands, with good bone, though not coarse, is more feminine than masculine, very correct, and beautifully balanced.”

In moderate contrast, “Winter Memories is somewhat taller and also has a little more scope,” Phillips said. “Winter Memories has a lot of similarities to her dam but is larger and more powerfully built.”

Winter Memories also is the best of her dam’s offspring to date. From eight foals of racing age (two colts and six fillies), the mare has three stakes winners and the graded stakes-placed La Cloche (by Ghostzapper).

The mare’s first two foals were colts by Storm Cat. Of these, Phillips noted that “British Blue was quite handsome. A little on the small side but striking.” The colt sold as a yearling for $2.4 million, and both British Blue and his year-younger full brother won stakes.

Despite that level of success, Phillips continued looking for the right mate for his outstanding daughter of Silver Hawk. He said, “It is a propensity of the mare that she can produce horses on the smallish side. Even with Aldebaran, who was not a small horse, the result was a filly who was too small. Even the Storm Cats – who are known for being strong, masculine horses – were neither really large nor exceptionally powerful.”

So the breeder kept searching for the match that would provide all the factors to help the mare reproduce her best qualities. Phillips said, “From a phenotype perspective, a horse with larger size, bigger bone, more scope seems better for her. Fundamentally, I love Roberto [the sire of Silver Hawk], where you have the opportunity to mix with Northern Dancer. It has been used many times with success. We used this cross several times with Memories of Silver, including twice to El Prado. The first time we got a small, very attractive chestnut who ended up placing in races, but still retired a maiden. But I liked the cross so much that we went right back. And at least one time it worked.”

The second time, the match produced Winter Memories, now a G1 winner.

The stable star is tentatively aiming for the Queen Elizabeth II at Keeneland (a race won by Memories of Silver in 1996), then possibly a break till racing next year. Phillips said, “She tolerates racing very well because she is easy to manage outside the race itself. She is very serious and competitive when she’s on the track, but she is very easy-going and mentally balanced the rest of the time. She’s a star.”

is coolmore setting the stage for the next euro invasion?

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belmont park, breeding in kentucky, cape blanco, coolmore, european bloodstock, galileo, giant's causeway, john magnier, man o' war stakes, montjeu, nasrullah, nijinsky, prejudice against turf horses, ribot, sadler's wells, stallions in kentucky, tale of the cat, woodman

The following post appeared earlier this week at Paulick Report.

Seems to me that there is more to Cape Blanco’s trip to New York for the Grade 1 Man o’ War Stakes than “just” winning another good purse and giving the 4-year-old son of Galileo a tour of the place.

First of all, I believe Coolmore’s farsighted chief, John Magnier, is trying to decide which of Galileo’s sons would do best standing here in the States. Coolmore and its associates have, at last count, approximately 87 sons of Galileo that are worth standing at stud, and surely some of them are worth giving a shot at Ashford Stud, Coolmore’s breeding operation in the U.S.

Coolmore has never been shy about sending a promising horse to stand in Kentucky. At one time, this branch of the operation seemed more hospitable territory than Ireland or Australia, with greater demand and profits in the Bluegrass as the international center of breeding.

That has waned somewhat, and Coolmore, despite its successes with Giant’s Causeway, Woodman, Tale of the Cat, and others, has not had any corresponding success with sons of their cornerstone sire Sadler’s Wells in Kentucky.

It was not for wont of trying.

Ashford stood some of the quickest sons of Sadler’s Wells, and they flopped horribly. Even allowing that the horses were somewhat unfamiliar to Kentucky breeders and that there is a vicious antipathy against turf horses here, the sons of Sadler’s Wells just stunk up the place.

It happens.

At the same time, however, the two best sons of Sadler’s Wells, Montjeu and Galileo, were gaining accolades on the racecourse and then building on that to become the most important stallions in Europe.

Montjeu and Galileo are both classic winners; both have sired classic winners, including victors in the English Derby. Almost overnight, they have turned that “long-distance classic” back into the most important racing test for bloodstock in the world.

And as a result of these mighty achievements, the pair might well be the two best stallions in the world.

Of the two sons of Sadler’s Wells, the Galileos have notable amounts of speed, and their pace generally allows them to be placed effectively throughout a race, to make a move when it is to their advantage, and to win if they are good enough.

That is what Cape Blanco did in the Man o’ War. And those are the qualities of great European-bred or -raced sires who have excelled in America, such as Nasrullah, Nijinsky, and Ribot.

And it stands to reason that an operation such as Coolmore, abounding with the blood of these two stallions, should look afar for opportunities to place the right horse with the right qualities in a spot to earn greater success.

That brings up the second reason for Cape Blanco to be in New York in the middle of the year, rather than the tail-end of the season. For a European-bred horse to earn a following among Kentucky breeders, the animal needs to develop a name, essentially to brand himself as a star of the American turf.

Part of that is to win the important stakes in front of many of the breeders who would use a high-end stallion and who would want to breed to a son of Galileo. Cape Blanco’s sire Galileo has not been a stranger to racing here in the States. He has sired important winners, such as Red Rocks, who won a pair of G1s in the Breeders’ Cup Turf and the Man o’ War.

With the known adaptability of the Galileo stock, it is possible that Coolmore is simply emulating the success of Red Rocks, with a warm-up in the summer race before a strike for the G1 Arlington Million or similar event, then the Breeders’ Cup.

But with the natural speed of the Galileo stock and with the sound enthusiasm that they take to their racing, I believe there is more afoot. The Galileos would make good racers here in the U.S. Cape Blanco, for instance, was unbeaten as a 2-year-old, won a G1 at 10 and at 12 furlongs at 3, and has now added his third at the premium level.

Cape Blanco may be on a solo mission, or he may be the forerunner of a Galileo invasion. Either way, racing and breeding are sure to be the better for the change.

northern dancer’s classic influence continuing impressively

Tags

bosra sham, classic bloodlines, classic success, conquistador cielo, coolmore sires, darshaan, difficulty of winning derby, english derby, female-line descent, galileo, high chaparral, lammtarra, male-line descent, montjeu, nijinsky, northern dancer, pour moi, records of contemporary sires, royal statute, sadler's wells

The following story was published earlier this week at Paulick Report.

Confirming last week’s headline story from Ray’s Paddock (a feature section at http://www.paulickreport.com), Northern Dancer loomed very large over Saturday’s English Derby at Epsom. The winner, Montjeu’s son Pour Moi, is a great-grandson of Northern Dancer descending in male line from the great stallion’s most successful son to spend his entire stud career outside of Kentucky: Sadler’s Wells.

Moreover, Pour Moi also comes in the female line from Northern Dancer’s very high-class daughter Royal Statute, who has become one of the most important producers in the breed for classic quality. In terms of classic bloodlines, Pour Moi’s first three dams are Gwynn (by French Derby winner Darshaan), Victoress (by Belmont Stakes winner Conquistador Cielo), and Royal Statute (by Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Northern Dancer).

Those are serious classic credentials, and in addition to important classic winners and sires in the female line, this is the family of such classic stars as Bosra Sham, Hector Protector, and Lammtarra.
Statistics about the male line of the English Derby winner grab headlines, and well they might. Northern Dancer sired three Derby winners at Epsom (Nijinsky, The Minstrel, and Secreto). That is the contemporary record for winners of the English Derby, which Northern Dancer shares with his son Nijinsky (Golden Fleece, Shahrastani, and Lammtarra) and now Montjeu (Authorized and Motivator, added now to Pour Moi).

That statistic is very interesting for a couple of reasons. For one thing, Montjeu’s all-conquering sire Sadler’s Wells is not on the list with three winners or more. Although a handy horse with speed, Sadler’s Wells got a lot of rangy and rather lanky types who, year after year, found one horse or two just a bit too good for them at Epsom.

In fact, for many years, it appeared that Sadler’s Wells might never break the apparent jinx that Epsom’s turns and gradients exercised over his offspring, and the great stallion left it late in his career before getting his first English Derby winner. That longed-for winner was nothing less than Galileo in 2001, when Sadler’s Wells was 20. Then High Chaparral came along the next year to make siring back-to-back Derby winners seem rather easy.

It had not been, and getting the winner at Epsom is never easy.

Prior to Galileo, numerous sons of Sadler’s Wells had gone into the big event with very good credentials and form, yet had finished no better than second or third. It was widely being said that Sadler’s Wells “gets a lot of really good horses but doesn’t get the real killer who can win at Epsom.”

And it is noteworthy that Montjeu, two years before Galileo, was sent to race for the Derbys at Chantilly and the Curragh (winning both) but not to Epsom.

The late 1990s also were the period when many breeders in Europe were criticizing Sadler’s Wells as a sire of stallions, and that is the second point of interest about the list of contemporary sires of English Derby winners. The great sire’s sons to that time had not become anything like as successful as their sire at stud.

And when breeders begin to get cold feet about a sire’s capacity for siring the supreme champions and about getting the next generation’s breeding stock, it is bad news. Because those breeders will also take their premium mares elsewhere.

But then Montjeu, Galileo, and High Chaparral began to erase those niggling doubts. And now Montjeu and his fellow star at Coolmore, Galileo, are firmly entrenched as the two best classic stallions in Europe. This year, the first two home in the English Derby were Pour Moi and Treasure Beach (by Galileo).

For these and numerous other successes, Sadler’s Wells is lauded as one of the pre-eminent sires of stallions on both sides of the Atlantic, with El Prado and his sons Medaglia d’Oro and Kitten’s Joy doing good work here in the States.

How things can change in the span of a decade.

frankel joins elite band of classic stars

Tags

2000 guineas, comparative form, danehill, english classics, frankel, galileo, great classic winners, henry cecil, juddmonte farms, khalid abdullah, kind, phil bull, racing class, tudor minstrel, uncle mo

The following post was published earlier this week at Paulick Report.

The paths of the two most exciting juvenile colts of last year (Uncle Mo and Frankel) have not followed the same trajectory. Although Uncle Mo only lost his unbeaten status in the Wood Memorial last month, questions and innuendos have followed his every step this year. And coming into the Kentucky Derby this weekend, this son of the fine sire Indian Charlie appears to have a steep mountain to climb if he is to claim a classic and regain much of the prestige he earned with his juvenile successes.

In stunning contrast is the current status of the English star Frankel.

A son of Galileo, who is the best European stallion (and probably the best active stallion in the world), Frankel won his classic, the English 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket, with such authority and verve that the dashing bay colt is already being compared to the greats of racing.

At a luncheon conference in Lexington on Monday at Roly Poly’s sandwich shop, the consensus was that Frankel deserves to be spoken of in the company of such stars as Nijinsky, Mill Reef, El Gran Senor, and even Brigadier Gerard.

Of all the great English and Irish classic winners and premium milers, perhaps the one most similar to Frankel is 2,000 Guineas winner Tudor Minstrel, who claimed the classic in 1947 by an even larger margin than Frankel’s six lengths.

Tudor Minstrel shot away from his competitors at the start, and by the half-mile, he had the field at full stretch just trying to keep up with him. It was to no avail, and the colt strode home by eight to 10 lengths, depending on who was counting. Timeform founder Phil Bull wrote in his commentary about the race: “The memory of Tudor Minstrel’s strolling home the length of a street in front of everything else will remain with me for the rest of my life.”

Watching Frankel rip away from his competition in the Guineas on Saturday was similar. Frankel put all his competition under pressure from the start, built a lead that the announcer called 15 lengths at the half, and came home with less than half that to spare, as the colt appeared to idle as he came up the gradient to the wire at Newmarket.

And of course, the most impressive quality about Frankel’s handling of the race and his contemporaries was that it did not seem an extreme exertion. From the fluency of his action and smoothness of his stride, Frankel seemed comfortable racing so fast his opponents couldn’t keep up.

With Frankel, as with Tudor Minstrel 64 years ago, the buzz about them coming toward the Derby at Epsom was and will be intense. In 1947, Tudor Minstrel pulled hard, ran himself silly, and was beaten as one of the hottest favorites in Derby history.

Frankel, on the other hand, well may not even start in the race. Trainer Henry Cecil has trained generations of this family for owner-breeder Khalid Abdullah, and Cecil has never been sanguine about this colt’s prospects for racing 12 furlongs.

Given the colt’s enthusiastic approach to racing, the trainer is probably on solid ground, as no horse can race as boldly as Frankel likes to go, for a mile and a half over the undulations and turns of the course at Epsom.

Furthermore, in his comments about Frankel last season, Cecil was quite candid about his doubts that Frankel would stay even a mile because of the aptitude and racing character of his talented dam, the Danehill mare Kind. A listed stakes winner, Kind was very talented, according to her trainer, not so kind in rationing her speed.

Her massively talented son seems to have inherited not only speed but also a considerable lust for chasing down the wind.

And that is not the attitude of a horse well-suited to racing a dozen furlongs in classic company. So Frankel is most likely to go to the St James’s Palace Stakes, then perhaps the Eclipse and Breeders’ Cup Mile.

One of the nice things about that schedule is a trip across the Atlantic for the Breeders’ Cup would mean that American racing fans could get to see Frankel too, and that is a prospect to whet the appetites of all who love racing.

who would match zenyatta best?

Tags

a.p. indy, bernardini, congrats, distorted humor, galileo, hypothetical matings, kingmambo, malibu moon, mating the champion, montjeu, Pulpit, zenyatta

No doubt, Jerry and Ann Moss have ideas of their own about which stallion best suits their great mare, but we denizens of the blogosphere who have watched and cheered and posted about Zenyatta are happy speculators in this fascinating game we term “horse breeding.”

As a broodmare prospect, Zenyatta has nearly everything we could hope for. She has immense athletic ability, is by a good sire, is out of a very good broodmare, and has a distinguished female family on both sides of the pedigree.

The two characteristics that most concern me about her broodmare potential are her size and relative lack of speed. The mare simply must not be bred to too large a stallion because Zenyatta will put plenty of size in her foals. She needs no help there. But she does need a bit more lick out of the gate.

So stallions such as AP Indy; his outstanding sons Pulpit, Malibu Moon, and Bernardini (even Congrats); and Distorted Humor offer proven speed, as well as classic potential.

There’s no getting around it. Zenyatta is the classic type. Big, rugged, and scopy, the mare has been begging for 10 furlongs (or farther), and ran her two best races in the BC Classic at that distance.

If Kingmambo were still breeding, he would be another to consider for the mare and would not be a factor for increasing size or diminishing speed. The fact that Kingmambo raced in Europe and tends to get horses well suited to turf racing and going middle distances is not a problem, either.

Zenyatta would have excelled over turf courses. I could see her rumbling mightily up the straight at Epsom or stretching out and gassing her opponents over the sweeping expanse at Doncaster.

And, as it happens, two stallions standing in Ireland would be extremely tempting mates for Zenyatta. Both are Epsom Derby winners by Sadler’s Wells standing at Coolmore: Montjeu and Galileo.

The Montjeu stock have the reputation of being rather “hot,” which might be too much of a good thing. Galileo, on the other hand, is consistent as a sire of classic stock who have speed, some early maturity, and plenty of quality.

Which stallions would be on your list for Zenyatta?