Thanks to alliteration, the words Super Saturday just trip off the tongue and consequently they have been applied to a wide range of events. For Lane's End Farm, though, the latest Super Saturday was just three days ago, when two of the farm's stallions monopolized the Grade I juvenile events at Los Alamitos. Firstly the [...]

As a faithful member of the Roberto fan club, I have long been intrigued by the battle for survival of his male line in North America and Europe. There have been many twists and turns along the way, with his male line effectively becoming an endangered species, even though numerous sons of the outstanding Darby [...]

While it is always a notable achievement for a stallion to take the title of leading freshman sire, it mustn't be forgotten that this title doesn't always confer a one-way ticket to long-term success. The title holders since 2001 are something of a mixed bag, and for every Distorted Humor, Tiznow, Street Cry, Tapit and [...]

Anyone wanting to demonstrate the vast size and scope of A.P. Indy's legacy could do worse than point to last Saturday's Delta Downs Jackpot S. This million-dollar Grade III attracted 10 runners, of which four were sired by A.P. Indy's sons Congrats, Bernardini, Flatter and Mineshaft, while two others belonged to the first crops by [...]

Anyone could be forgiven for thinking that Japanese racing and breeding revolves entirely around Deep Impact. Certainly, this son of Sunday Silence has by far the greatest international reputation of any Japanese stallion, as we are likely to be reminded when his G1 Poule d'Essai des Pouliches winner Beauty Parlour comes under the hammer at [...]

In the general scheme of things, I'm not sure how highly the seventh edition of the GI Breeders' Cup Classic ranks. Second, beaten only a length, was the English turf horse Ibn Bey, fresh from his victory in the G1 Irish St Leger. Third, a further length behind, came Thirty Six Red, a GI Wood [...]

To describe Monsun as the Sadler's Wells or Galileo of the German bloodstock industry may be overstating it a little, but this son of Konigsstuhl dominated the German Thoroughbred to a highly impressive extent. He was champion sire on four occasions and sired three winners of the G1 Deutsches Derby. One of his sons, Samum, [...]

There was a certain symmetry to the weekend's top events, with Group 1 victories in the Southern and Northern Hemispheres going to the progeny of stallions shuttled from the opposite hemisphere. Firstly, the G1 Cox Plate fell to Winx, who was conceived after her sire Street Cry flew in from his Darley base in Kentucky [...]

I'm sure you're familiar with what they call the commentator's curse. For example, when some innocent declares that “I've rarely seen him hit his backhand better,” you can be sure that the player will mistime his next shot so badly that the ball ricochets off the racquet into the rafters. I perpetrated such an error [...]

Galileo (Ire), like just about every Thoroughbred, has a male line tracing to Eclipse, the legendary horse whose name lives on in the phrase “Eclipse first, the rest nowhere.” I have recounted before how this phrase came about, on the day that Eclipse made his debut in May 1769. Contesting a race scheduled to be [...]

As the unexpected is part of the appeal of racing and breeding, it is always fascinating when a comparatively inexpensive stallion manages to bridge the considerable gap which separates them from the elite sires. Danzig's tough son Green Desert was responsible for two such stallions. First to make the leap was the miler Cape Cross, [...]

As Brave Anna and Roly Poly strolled around the pre-parade ring together, it was impossible not to notice the physical similarities between the two, which extend to their facial markings. Perhaps this is hardly surprising because they are bred along similar lines. Whereas the victorious Brave Anna is out of a daughter of Sadler's Wells, [...]