In the second part of the November Kentucky Stallions series, I’m talking about stallions from two farms you may be familiar with –Spendthrift and Taylor Made.
It’s another star studded group of experienced and new stallions with some of my favorite photos and facts on stallions at the farms. If you missed Part 1 (Lane’s End, Three Chimneys, and WinStar), you can read it here.
All in all, there are 14 stallions and one other guest from the farms being covered in today’s blog.
Last week I talked about one of the two horses who beat Authentic in his career and the Horse of the Year starts us off this week. Authentic rarely put a foot wrong, winning three major Grade 1 races. He capped his career with a 2 ¼ length win in the G1 Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic and earned both Horse of the Year and Champion 3-Year-Old honors.
A $350,000 yearling purchase, Authentic retired with $7,201,200 in earnings in his eight start career. Not surprisingly with his credentials, Authentic bred the third most mares of any North American stallion last year when standing for $75,000. Spendthrift dipped him just a bit this year to $70,000 for that tough second season.
Dual Grade 1 winner Brody’s Cause is another one of those useful Giant’s Causeway sons that just quietly does his job without a lot of fanfare. The stallion recently recorded his first Grade 1 winner when Kalypso won the G1 La Brea and his seven stakes performers is 13th best in the crop but most of those above him have a larger number of runners.
A.P. Indy is an outcross to Brody’s Cause’s pedigree and crossing to him is working well at getting good horses. Kalpyso is out of an A.P. Indy granddaughter (through late Spendthrift stallion Malibu Moon) as are two other stakes performers (through Mineshaft and Pulpit) with seven winners overall out of A.P. Indy granddaughters. A.P. Indy daughters have only produced two named foals by Brody’s Cause but both are winners.
The Halo line is also one that is looking like one to watch with this stallion. Two Halo grandsons (More Than Ready and Ocean Terrace) are responsible for two of his stakes performers with More Than Ready the damsire of his Grade 2 winner Sittin On Go.
Brody’s Cause stands for $5,000 in 2022 with 42 2-year-olds coming from his third crop.
New to Spendthrift this year, By My Standards is a third generation stallion for the farm with both his sire Goldencents and his grandsire Into Mischief standing alongside him.
By My Standards never won a Grade 1 but was about as tough a racehorse as you can find in North America these days. He won seven of his 17 starts with six other top three finishes in a career that saw him run out of stakes company just once after breaking his maiden in his fourth start. By My Standards won four Grade 2s and was second in two of the Grade 1s he ran in for nearly $2.3 million in earnings.
A stallion with stakes winners under each of his five first dams, By My Standards stands for $7,500 in 2022.
The above stallion’s sire Goldencents has been a good sire from the start and finally scored his first Grade 1 winner last year with Rodeo Drive winner Going To Vegas. In all, Goldencents has 13 stakes winners and 38 stakes performers, led by five graded stakes winners.
A three-time Grade 1 winner, Goldencents is an interesting potential mate if you have a Gone West granddaughter. Two of his graded stakes winners and one other stakes winner is bred on that cross (it’s the same cross that works with his sire and produced Authentic) with 14 winners overall on it. Another Mr. Prospector son in Seeking The Gold is also proving to be a successful cross with his granddaughters producing two stakes winners and five winners overall from five to race by Goldencents.
Going away from the Mr. Prospector line, Arch is also the damsire of two stakes performers from two to race by Goldencents including last year’s juvenile stakes winner Verylittlecents. Langfuhr also has two stakes performers from four out of his daughters by the subject stallion.
Goldencents stands for $15,000 at Spendthrift in 2022 with 179 2-year-olds waiting in the wings for later this year.
At Taylor Made, another Into Mischief son is trying to make his own impact on the breed with Instagrand’s first foals arriving now.
Heavily supported by owner Larry Best in his first season at stud, among Instagrand’s first foals born this year was a filly by Grade 1 winner Concrete Rose. Others who visited him last year were G1 Breeders’ Cup Distaff winner Blue Prize and emerging bluehen broodmare Indian Miss.
A $1.2 million 2-year-old purchase, Instagrand won the G2 Best Pal Stakes and placed in both the G1 Santa Anita Derby and one other graded stakes. He bred 190 mares last year, the fifth highest of any freshman sire. He stands for $7,500 in 2022.
Another stallion Larry Best is heavily supporting is Instilled Regard, who also has first foals this year. A Grade 1 winner on turf and Grade 3 winner/G1-placed runner on dirt, Instilled Regard is a grandson of champion Heavenly Prize, who has a strong production record that she has passed through the generations.
Instilled Regard’s first foal was a filly out of the stakes winner and stakes producing Hung The Moon. Others in his book last year included multiple Grade 1 winner Cambier Parc and multiple grade 2 winner Beau Recall.
Instilled Regard is one of only three Arch sons recorded in the Stallion Register as standing at stud in Kentucky this year. He’ll stand for $7,500 in 2022 after breeding 67 mares his first season at stud.
Jimmy Creed is arguably Distorted Humor’s best son at stud with 15 stakes winners and 44 stakes performers from 320 runners. As a racehorse, Jimmy Creed won a top edition of the G1 Malibu with the field including Private Zone, Fed Biz, Drill, etc. and went on to place in two more Grade 1s at four.
The 13-year-old has 13.75% stakes performers to his name and earned his first Grade 1 winner last year when Casa Creed won the G1 Jaipur. The interesting thing about Jimmy Creed is that he can sire a juvenile stakes winner (he’s at six 2-year-old stakes winners and Kaufymaker placed third in last year’s G2 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint) or an older horse with Classic Lady winning the Ticonderoga Stakes at six last year.
A.P. Indy sons are the broodmare sires of one stakes winner and nine stakes performers by the subject stallion with 24 winners from 29 runners. A.P. Indy daughters have produced two stakes performers – including a stakes winner from their four winners from four to race. A name you don’t see too often in the broodmare sire ranks is Bellamy Road, but he’s made the most of it when his daughters are sent to Jimmy Creed. There are only three runners from the cross but one is Casa Creed and the other is stakes winning Imnogood.
Jimmy Creed is about to enter his ninth season at stud and stands for $10,000 at Spendthrift this year.
Likely Horse of the Year Knicks Go enters stud at Taylor Made next month after finishing second in the Pegasus World Cup on Saturday.
Owned by the Korea Racing Authority, Knicks Go was originally destined to stand in South Korea until he won five of seven starts last year, including three Grade 1s led by the Pegasus and the G1 Breeders’ Cup Classic. That came on the heels of a win in the G1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile the year before.
A throwback who raced from two to five (with one start at six), Knicks Go won 10 of his 25 starts with five other top three finishes. That record includes a G1 Claiborne Breeders Futurity victory and a G1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile runner-up finish at two, a stakes placing at three, then his aforementioned accomplishments the last two years.
Knicks Go is set to stand his first season at Taylor Made for $30,000 in 2022.
We’re taking a brief pause in the action before going to the second half of the stallions to appreciate this Spendthrift barn cat.
A resident in many barns, barn cats play an important role on a farm. Not only do they keep rodents away but they also can act as a soothing presence for nervous horses with many horses quickly adopting the cats that share their barn.
Now back to our regularly scheduled blog.
A freaky fast sprinter, who also won a Grade 1 at a mile, Mitole entered stud in 2020 after a championship career. Making most of his starts at three and four with just one at two, Mitole won 10 of 14 and was never off the board for $3.1 million in earnings.
Mitole was the first stakes winner for his dam but that didn’t last long. His half-brother Hot Rod Charlie became her second last year as one of the best 3-year-olds in the nation with a Grade 1 victory and top three finishes in the two classic races he ran in.
Mitole’s first weanlings averaged $86,400 with a median of $80,000 last year with his colts averaging $109,706 for 17 sold. After breeding 230 mares in his first year at stud (6th most of any stallion) and 208 last year (10th most), Mitole stands for $15,000 this year.
A sleeper stallion in the third crop sire ranks is Medaglia d’Oro son Mshawish. A dual surface Grade 1 winner who won stakes in three different countries, Mshawish is the sire of 10 stakes horses from 93 starters (10.75%) and 61.3% winners with 70% of his racing age foals making it to the track.
It’s a familiar feeling to say that Mshawish is another who crosses well with the A.P. Indy line. A.P. Indy granddaughters (by Malibu Moon and Friends Lake) are responsible for two of his stakes horses and nine winners from 10 runners overall. A.P. Indy’s grandson Tapit is also the damsire of Mshawish’s stakes-placed Spectatorless.
Smart Strike and English Channel also combine for two of his other stakes performers. One cross that hasn’t been tried much but has seen success is Mshawish crossed on Street Cry mares. That cross has three winners from three to run, including a stakes-placed runner. Those two Mr. Prospector lines are joined by Lemon Drop Kid (Kingmambo) and Whywhywhy (Mr. Greeley) as Mr. P branches that have produced stakes performers for Mshawish.
Mshawish has 40 2-year-olds this year and is standing for $5,000 at Taylor Made for his sixth season at stud.
Giant’s Causeway has multiple useful sons in the United States but it looks like he may have a top class heir with his son Not This Time exceeding expectations as one of the top third crop stallions in the world.
Not This Time showed a lot of talent with an 8 ¾ length romp in the G3 Iroquois and a runner-up finish in the G1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile but had to retire after that start.
He bred 145 mares his first season at stud and the resulting foals came out running in 2020. Two years on, Not This Time leads all third-crop sires with 17 stakes winners and four graded stakes winners. The sire of Grade 1 winner Princess Noor in his first crop, he registered his fourth graded stakes winner from that 2018 crop on Saturday when Just One Time won the G2 Inside Information. Last year’s 2-year-olds have carried on the success with his 2019 crop including seven stakes winners and one other stakes performer.
Princess Noor (a granddaughter of Awesome Again) leads a cross with Awesome Again daughters/granddaughters that also produced the stakes winner Next. In all, Awesome Again daughters have produced three winners from four runners on this cross and his granddaughters have two winners from two to race.
Candy Ride over Giant’s Causeway gave us Horse of the Year Gun Runner and it looks like the opposite cross is working with Not This Time. The stallion has two stakes winners and five winners from five runners out of Candy Ride mares. The Giant’s Causeway son x Candy Ride cross is overall a successful one with four stakes winners and six stakes performers from 53 runners. Another branch of the Northern Dancer line that has success with Not This Time so far is El Prado sons with Medaglia d’Oro and Paddy O’Prado the broodmare sires of two Not This Time stakes winners. That particular cross has two stakes winners from three runners.
Not This Time has 59 2-year-olds this year with 111 yearlings and he bred 160 last year. Not surprisingly, Taylor Made has raised Not This Time’s stud fee with it currently sitting at $45,000.
Possibly the best bred freshman in the world this year, Tacitus is by multiple champion sire Tapit and out of champion racemare Close Hatches. While Tacitus never won a Grade 1 himself, he was second in three of them – including the G1 Belmont Stakes – and third in three others – including the G1 Kentucky Derby. In all, the 6-year-old won or placed in 11 of 17 races for over $3.7 million in earnings.
Tapit sons have sired 13 Grade 1 winners, 44 graded stakes winners and 128 stakes winners overall with that group including Monomoy Girl (Tapizar) and Tiz The Law (Constitution).
Tacitus is standing for $10,000 this year at Taylor Made.
The winner of four of his nine starts, Thousand Words is another welcoming his first foals in 2022 from his stall at Spendthrift.
From the first Pioneerof the Nile crop conceived after American Pharoah’s Triple Crown winning season, Thousand Words caught the eye in the sales ring and brought $1 million as a yearling. He went undefeated in his first three starts, including two graded stakes and three starts later recorded a second in the G3 Los Alamitos Derby. A win in the Listed Shared Belief Stakes was his final victory with the colt running two more times before retiring.
He is out of a multiple Grade 2 winner and multiple Grade 1-placed mare with that mare one of three stakes performers for her own dam. Pioneerof the Nile only has a few sons at stud but those sons have sired five Grade 1 winners (three by American Pharoah and two by Courtier), 20 graded stakes winners and 52 stakes winners.
Thousand Words was popular last year with 184 mares bred and stands for $7,500 in his second season.
The winner of six of his eight starts for over $1.2 million in earnings, Vekoma won back-to-back Grade 1 races at four in addition to the G2 Blue Grass Stakes at three and two other stakes with a third in a G2 to round it out. His only off-the-board finish came when 12th in the G1 Kentucky Derby.
By emerging sire-of-sires Candy Ride, Vekoma is out of the Grade 1 winning Mona de Momma. That mare is one of four stakes performers for a half-sister to multiple stakes winner and successful sire Mr. Greeley with those under Vekoma’s third dam also including champion Street Sense.
Standing his first season at stud in 2021, Vekoma was the second most popular freshman sire and fourth most popular overall when breeding 222 mares – just nine away from the top spot. He takes a slight dip in his second season at stud, standing for $17,500 this year.
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