Pedigree Query

Ok.. I am looking into buying a stallion with, from what I can tell.. Good Bloodlines..

What would you say to a stud who has...

DAMASCUS
SECRETARIAT
DANZIG
GRAUSTARK
ACK ACK

All in his pedigree..

As far as race..
His sire made - $1,061,193
His dam made - $134,762

Well, I'm no expert, and you are already standing two thoroughbred stallions, so I'm sure you know more than I do. However, most people on this board who talk about this type of information seem to frequently emphasize that it's not the existence of great horses in the pedigree as such, but where exactly in the pedigree they occur. Other things to consider: the sire of your potential stallion obviously has an exemplary race record, but what his his production record? What is the race record of your stallion himself? Has your stallion produced any offspring and what have they done? The fact that the dam has a successful race record is definitely a plus, but has the dam and the female family in general produced winners? Has the female family any record of producing successful sires? There are several posters on this board to whom a stallion with no race record (or a poor one) and a poor female family would be considered not be worth breeding to. There are others who ignore the female family and focus on the sires in the pedigree.

Using Secretariat from your list as an example. Secretariat, like, many of the others on your list, appears in many, many pedigrees. However, if Secretariat was the sire of your stallion, that might give people pause, as Secretariat hasn't really proven to be a sire of sires. But, if Secretariat was the broodmare sire, and the mare won as much as you say, then that might generate an entirely different opinion. Another thing that people would want to know, I imagine, is if there was inbreeding to any of the sires mentioned in the list, or other inbreeding, and linebreeding is very important to many of the posters on the board.

Other tools that posters tend to use for assessment of quality are the gsv number, the dosage profile, and the mare conduit profiles. With these and every other characteristic I have mentioned, there seem to be as many opinions as there are horses out there (well, almost).

That being said, these are all good horses in the pedigree. I particularly always like to see Ack Ack from the Domino line. I imagine that people will want more information but I can also see that you might not want to release the stallion's name in case it might compromise the sale.

I guess the other question is what are the intentions for your stallion? Is he going to be bred with the intent of producing racehorses? I ask this because the comments above pertain to pedigree qualities that seem to be looked for in a successful sire of racehorses, and if your intent was otherwise, concerns might be entirely different. Your thread title of hunter/race is a bit ambiguous. I did look at your website and you don't currently seem to be breeding to race.

An honest evaluation isn't able without knowing the purpose of the horse. If he is to sire sporthorses, conformation photos are needed, as well as a sound pedigree. If he's to sire foals to race, we'd need the actual pedigree. Conformation photos help as well. Good luck though, I visited your website, and you have a lovely farm.

Ok..

As far as info on what he would be used for... I breed hunters, and this guy is super flashy!! Well put together! All around great looking horse!!

Haven't been able to look at him in person yet, but will very soon! I cannot give out his pedigree yet.

Info is below about his pedigree.. Question.. Could he be taken seriously as a sire of race offspring? Do any of the horses in his pedigree have proven hunter/sporthorse offspring or are they known for sporthorse offspring?

Here we go Sorry it is confusing..

Sires side- Damascus is at the very top- forth row over! Shenanignas is down 3. Secretariat is below Shenanigans. Ack Ack is down two from Secretariat.

BM side- Danzig is the Sires Sire of the broodmare. Graustark is the Dams, Dams, Dams- sire.

Linebred Northern Dancer, and Bold Ruler.

No they arent right up close, but alot of money is very up close!! To the best of my knowledge, this guy hasnt raced.. I will let yall know. He has not foaled any offspring either..

His sire made $1,061,200. His sires sire made $1,244,000 His sires dam made $3,170 (may be unfinished)

His dam made $135,000 His dams sire made over $1,118,100 in earnings. And his dams Dam made $172,600.

So he is unproven, but he is not very old. This is the info at the top of his pedigree... DP = 2-6-7-3-0 (18) DI = 1.77 CD = 0.39

Tell me what you think.. I will get more info in a bit!!

Thanks everyone!!

Thanks for the info, Stephanie. I can't comment on the hunter/jumper aspect, but as far as the assessment of whether he could be taken seriously as a racing sire goes I'd vote with the crowd and say that people would have to know the whole of the pedigree, as they'd want to evaluate on the basis of all the aspects (and probably more) that I mentioned in my first post.

The horse in question was a $2000 yearling. His sire, tho a terrific race horse, stands for $4000, I believe. The dam is stakes placed by Polish Navy and has been a fairly poor producer, tho she did have an expensive El Corredor that I dont know how he has raced. As far as siring race horses, it would be a seriously uphill battle.

You should get some soundness, Private Terms had about 85% runners with few graded winners. Afternoon Delites was one of his big horses. If this guy has any value then I am guessing it would be as a sports horse sire only. I would NOT take my chance.

good god, just spill the registered name so we can do a pedigree analysis!!

what's with the the vagueness?

Springboro, I think the problem is that the sale was not finalized and at that point releasing the horse's name could compromise the sale. I agree it does make it difficult to respond to the original post, but I have seen questions like this pop up before, where a poster has been unable to give the name of a horse because of an impending sale.

I think a lot of folks new to race breeding do not realize that MOST TBs have "famous" or "Great" racehorses in their pedigrees. I could be mis-judging this case, but I like to see the first 3 generations fist and, yes, it's interesting and important in a way to go back at least 5 generations, but I'd be surprised if I DIDN'T see some big names back in there. that said, the OP may want specifics about what those stallions throw, but again, I think the mares and stallions closer up in the pedigree, and the individual himself will make more of a difference. I can't tell you how many people say their TB has Alydar or Secretariat or Man O' War (insert famous horse here) in their pedigree like it is something rare. I think it's great that people are enthused and know those horses, but most modern racehorses have quite a few famous names in their past. Not saying that is what the OP is doing - can't really tell from the post.

As for the rest of the questions - his sire and dam made decent money - for racing it would matter to me what types of races they were - Graded stakes? Regional stakes? Did they grind it out over time? Did they race at 2? Did they race at 5? Are they speed or distance? Dirt or Grass?

Anyway, I love horses for braveness and jumping ability (I always think eventing) that have Ack Ack not too far back in the pedigree. Not sure what the others bring to the table as far as the hunters go. I don't think it matters as long as this stallion has good hunter conformation and a nice square jump himself.

There have been other posts, too, about good bloodlines for sport horse TBs. Try a search; if you don't have any luck, I'll see if I can dig & find them.

And witherbee, I don't think you're wrong in saying that many don't realize the number of "great" horses in a pedigree. It was the mistake I made, which is what got me hooked on pedigree research! I had found a cheap, good-looking mare & thought I had something when I saw the names in her pedigree. Little did I know until I started looking up many more pedigrees that what you're saying was true...

And I often see TB ads with "decendant of War Admiral" or something similar. What's difficult for me is looking at pedigrees of some gorgeous sport TB stallions, but I can't get past either their OK pedigrees or the crappy pedigree matches to my mare, even if the conformation match is good... or if it is a good pedigree match, they're in AZ or something. I know it doesn't matter for sport, but I'd like to have both! And the closest stallion to me did have both—great build & great pedigree match—and he mysteriously died last year...

Good luck with this stallion, I'm hoping you'll be able to tell us who he is soon!