If you have a broodmare with little or no blacktype, don't give up hope of breeding a good racehorse! Read this story from Thoroughbred Times:
by John P. Sparkman
At the time second-year stallion Lido Palace (Chi) covered the 10-year-
old Aloha Prospector mare Princess Aloha in 2005, there had not
been a stakes winner along her tail-female line for six generations. Neither
Princess Aloha nor any of her first five dams, nor indeed any of their descendants, had produced a black-type runner of any description since Oserian, by *Court Martial out of Princess Aloha’s sixth dam, Bright Crest, by Mieuxce, won the 1958 Sandown Park Stud Produce Stakes.
As it turned out, Princess Aloha herself had already produced the foal that would end that long class drought, but at the time of her mating with Lido Palace in February 2005, her ’04 colt by Lite the Fuse, subsequently named On the Vineyard, was but a spindly yearling at breeder Lynne Scace’s Florida farm. On the Vineyard, trained by Scace, raced seven times in 2007, winning three races, including the six-furlong Collegian Stakes at Suffolk Downs.
While that 49-year gap between stakes wins for a female line is
probably not any kind of record, it is highly unusual. Even in an expanding
broodmare population, such consistent futility usually means
that mares from that line are exported or simply eliminated from anyone’s
broodmare band.
Thus the victory of Vineyard Haven—the result of that mating
between Lido Palace and Princess Aloha—in the Champagne Stakes
(G1) on October 4 at Belmont Park is surely one of the most remarkable
stories of this or any other racing season.
Like every Thoroughbred, Vineyard Haven’s female line eventually
traces to a very good broodmare. In his case, Lisma, by Persimmon,
his 11th dam, produced 1917 Kentucky Derby winner *Omar Khayyam,
by Marco, and founded a good family that—through other branches—
leads to top-class racehorse and excellent sire Honeyway, Japanese
champion three-year-old colt Fair Win, English highweight Susu (GB),
1982 Preakness Stakes (G1) winner Aloma’s Ruler, leading Argentine
sire Cipayo, and outstanding Irish sires Persian Bold and Lord Gayle.
Those horses, good as they were, are such distant relatives of
Vineyard Haven that in Thoroughbred terms, they cannot be called
relatives at all.
Thus it would be easy to ascribe Vineyard Haven’s obvious talent
mostly to his sire, Lido Palace. And indeed, Lido Palace was undeniably
a top-class runner, but since Vineyard Haven is one of only two
stakes winners from his first 89 foals, it is impossible to be very dogmatic
about such a conclusion.
Lido Palace was bred in Chile and was the champion two-year-old
male and three-year-old male in his native land. He won six of ten starts
in Chile, including two-thirds of the Chilean Triple Crown. He also
earned Horse of the Year honors at three before his importation to
North America in 2001.
Lido Palace quickly proved that his Chilean form was genuine,
winning the last two of his four North American starts in 2001, the
Whitney Handicap (G1) and Woodward Stakes (G1) (beating Albert
the Great and Tiznow). He was just as good as a five-year-old in 2002,
winning the Woodward for a second time and the Clark Handicap (G2).
Lido Palace’s sire, Rich Man’s Gold, a Grade 3-placed son of Forty
Niner, was a good sire in both Chile and South Africa, with at least 17
stakes winners and three other champions. With a half sister, Cremcaramel (Chi), by Roy, who was also a Chilean Horse of the Year,
Lido Palace could claim quite a good pedigree by South American standards, but an unfamiliar pedigree is anathema to Kentucky stallion masters.
Lido Palace began his stud career at Lambholm South in Fairfield,
Florida, for a stud fee of $8,500 in 2004. He now stands for $5,000.
While it is probable that Vineyard Haven’s obvious prowess will attract
more and, hopefully, better mares to his court, Lido Palace’s only
other stakes winner is based in Puerto Rico.
Vineyard Haven’s native ability cannot be explained by inbreeding.
His 4x4 duplication of Mr. Prospector is the only double within five
generations, a cross so common as to be unremarkable.
Thoroughbred breeding is a game of chance. Breeders spend millions
every year on broodmares and hundreds of thousands on expensive
stud fees trying to increase their probability of breeding a top
stakes winner.
Once in a very long while, however, the roll of the dice dictates that
what can only be described as a chance mating produces something
truly out of the ordinary. Vineyard Haven is that horse.
John P. Sparkman is bloodstock editor of THOROUGHBRED TIMES. His
e-mail address is [email protected].
Must-read for all owners of modest broodmares!
Moderators: Roguelet, hpkingjr, WaveMaster
Re: Must-read for all owners of modest broodmares!
Bohemia wrote:
Once in a very long while, however, the roll of the dice dictates that
what can only be described as a chance mating produces something
truly out of the ordinary.
Well that pretty much sums it up. Kind of like winning the lottery.
Sparkman mentions that there was a 49 year gap between stakes winners for that female line. A small breeder could go broke waiting that long for lightning to strike.
A friend of mine has a broodmare who has zero blacktype, yet all three of her foals to race this year are multiple winners (a 2yo, 3yo and 4yo) and my friend has earned over $80,000 in owner/breeder bonuses. She owns 2 of the 3 foals. Now, she's gotten really lucky - the foals have raced in Pa. You're screwed if the horses race out of state.
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faithfulfriend
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Laurierace
- Grade II Winner
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The last thing we need to do is encourage indiscriminate breeding. For every 1 horse who outruns his pedigree on the track there are tens of thousands who run exactly as their paper predicted. At that point it basically comes down to luck of the draw whether that horse lives or dies. If his owner is an asshat, he gets on a truck to Canada or Mexico when in reality he never should have been born in the first place.
Lots of Thoroughbreds are good at lots of things besides flat racing. If one breeds sound useful horses with good minds they will have a good chance to have good homes whether or not they are outstanding runners. Some multiple winners have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars and some stakes winners have earned much less. Black type is not the only measure of quality. Breeding unsound horses with lots of black type is more of a detriment than breeding sound horses without it. Average starts per runner keeps dropping because of unsound stallions and mares who are prone to fractures,etc. The unsound horses if gelded are most likely to end up on one of those trucks though some mares and some slow horses who could be good at something else have gone also. Some sport horse people are starting to get interested in Thoroughbred auctions now that prices have sunk. If most horses ran as their paper predicted then all those high priced yearlings would become graded stakes winners. A lot of horses run worse and some better. If it were up to some people there would be only graded stakes races and a handful of runners and probably one track in CA and one in NY. There is room and money for non black type horses and hopefully always will be. The offspring of "commercial" sires have ended up at horse rescues and slaughterhouses. Some of them sire a lot of horses who do not stay sound.
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Laurierace
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I never said blacktype was the only consideration when breeding a potential race horse, but to breed one with little to no chance of being a successful race horse because someone may make a hunter out of him is irresponsible. If YOU want to make him into a hunter or any other discipline under the sun when he fails at the track, you can breed anything to anything for all I care. As someone who has helped rehome hundreds of horses over the years, I can tell you those horses are the exception, not the rule. Until you have done it yourself you have no idea what it feels like to go into the kill pen and pick out the one horse you can afford to save, knowing full well that all the others in that same pen are doomed. Its like the holocaust, those eyes haunt you forever.
Laurierace wrote:I never said blacktype was the only consideration when breeding a potential race horse, but to breed one with little to no chance of being a successful race horse because someone may make a hunter out of him is irresponsible. If YOU want to make him into a hunter or any other discipline under the sun when he fails at the track, you can breed anything to anything for all I care. As someone who has helped rehome hundreds of horses over the years, I can tell you those horses are the exception, not the rule. Until you have done it yourself you have no idea what it feels like to go into the kill pen and pick out the one horse you can afford to save, knowing full well that all the others in that same pen are doomed. Its like the holocaust, those eyes haunt you forever.
Well said, Laurie. While I was reading the original article, I wanted to scream, "Why are you encouraging this kind of thing???" There are too many horses for the number of people who want and can afford to keep them, and that's true no matter what the breed! It's like every ding-dong who's got some cheap mare has to breed it to some cheap stud to get a cheap foal that costs more to raise than it will ever be worth!
BTW, this article wasn't about breeding unsound horses. It's not just stakes winners and stakes placed winners that have unsoundness issues. Maybe the reason this mare's family didn't produce any stakes horses for 49 years was because the only ones with enough speed also had a propensity towards unsoundness.
Successful race horses have ended up in those kill pens lots of times if they were gelded. Once they slow down or get injured they are just as likely to end up there as some that were never meant to race. Pedigree or previous success does not matter to some people. Let us not forget that 2 very famous race horses who were not even gelded ended up there and 2 rescues were named after them. Exceller and Ferdinand both ended up being turned into meat. Some Thoroughbreds sold to foreign countries where they eat horses have ended up there or might one day. I hope there will be no kill pens but pedigree or race track success or failure does not put them there. People who do not care did. There are a lot of people breeding for sport horses who have registered Thoroughbreds and do not intend to ever race them. If more of those people get interested in buying ex race horses or yearlings then they will be breeding less also. Breeding horses that cannot stay sound by horses that did not stay sound means more horses are at risk.
Laurierace wrote:I never said blacktype was the only consideration when breeding a potential race horse, but to breed one with little to no chance of being a successful race horse because someone may make a hunter out of him is irresponsible. If YOU want to make him into a hunter or any other discipline under the sun when he fails at the track, you can breed anything to anything for all I care. As someone who has helped rehome hundreds of horses over the years, I can tell you those horses are the exception, not the rule. Until you have done it yourself you have no idea what it feels like to go into the kill pen and pick out the one horse you can afford to save, knowing full well that all the others in that same pen are doomed. Its like the holocaust, those eyes haunt you forever.
Whichever side of the spectrum one comes down on, it takes more than bloodlines to produce a black-type winner or to produce a winner at all.
I would point to the amazing Princess Rooney, Paseana, Bayakoa, etc. They had everything going for them but all produced virtually nothing to indicate either their breeding or their talents were passed on.
If anyone really had the formula down, we'd have no cheap rejects at all.
People just need to be educated and responsible for the actions they take. It's stories like this thread that keep the dream alive. Wouldn't it be intriguing to try to figure out what on earth clicked just right? Something to maybe study.
My intention in posting this story was to show that it's not always the six-figure mares and stud fees that combine to produce graded stakes winners. This thread then seemed to disintegrate into a discussion about slaughter and unwanted horses. It's time to lighten up and just enjoy the story for what it was.
Nice post North Star and you summed up my feelings exactly. There is a difference between noncommercial and cheap and there could be a lot of reasons why a horse didn't get black type or a page looks a little bare besides just quality issues.
I love stories like this because it allows the rest of us to dream a little. Where I take issue is when someone breeds a horse with this kind of page and expects the commercial market to bail them out.
I love stories like this because it allows the rest of us to dream a little. Where I take issue is when someone breeds a horse with this kind of page and expects the commercial market to bail them out.