The Preakness Stakes (G1) is contested in Maryland, however this yr’s winner, Early Voting , has a sire and dam with deep roots in neighboring Virginia.
His sire, Gun Runner , traces to the famed Gallorette, as soon as voted the best race mare of the primary half of the twentieth century by readers of The BloodHorse. Gallorette was foaled in Maryland however spent her breeding profession as a resident of Virginia, and it is there that her stakes-winning Native Dancer daughter, Courbette, was foaled.
A department of the household returned to Virginia within the Nineteen Nineties when Edward P. “Ned” Evans bought Courbette’s great-granddaughter Quiet Dance. The $75,000 the daughter of Quiet American value on the 1994 Keeneland September Yearling Gross sales proved to be cash exceptionally effectively spent. Quiet Dance was a wise runner, taking the Gala Lil Stakes in 1997—appropriately sufficient at Pimlico Race Course—and second within the Demoiselle Stakes (G2), however was a fair higher broodmare. Along with Gun Runner’s grade 2-winning dam, Quiet Big , she produced 4 different stakes winners, headed by Horse of the Yr Saint Liam and the 2018 United Nations Stakes (G1T) scorer, Funtastic , and she or he’s granddam of one other winner on the highest stage in Buster’s Prepared , profitable within the Mom Goose Stakes (G1) of 2011. Each Quiet Dance and Quiet Big have been bought by Besilu Stables—breeder of Gun Runner—from Dispersal of the Property of Edward P. Evans on the 2011 Keeneland November Gross sales.
Gun Runner at Three Chimneys Farm
If not but fairly “the best sire the world has ever seen,” as described within the warmth of the second by Steve Asmussen, who skilled each Gun Runner and this yr’s Preakness Stakes runner-up, Epicenter , Gun Runner has made a very distinctive begin to his stud profession. Third within the 2016 Kentucky Derby Introduced by Yum! Manufacturers (G1) in his solely strive in a Triple Crown occasion, Gun Runner shook off his big-race bridesmaid tag to win the Clark Handicap (G1) over older horses late in his 3-year-old season, then returned as a dominant Horse of the Yr at 4 (including the Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes (G1) in his sole begin at 5).
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Retired to Three Chimneys Farm in Lexington, Ky., in 2018, he stood at an preliminary price of $70,000. Gun Runner has sired 11 particular person stakes winners from his first crop, seven graded, together with, along with Early Voting, champion 2-year-old filly of 2021 Echo Zulu ; final season’s Hopeful Stakes (G1) scorer, Gunite ; Cyberknife , profitable within the Arkansas Derby (G1) this yr; and Runhappy Santa Anita Derby (G1) victor Taiba .
The triumph of Early Voting within the Preakness implies that the primary two legs of the Triple Crown and the Kentucky Oaks have all fallen to the offspring of first-crop sires (the others being Eager Ice and Arrogate ). The success of freshman sires is usually attributed to attracting, for industrial causes, books of disproportionate high quality. We have believed for a while that there’s something particular a couple of sire’s first (or very early) crops that goes past that, and we have often noticed that even excellent sires who begin at modest charges often do not considerably enhance on their first crop, even with a lot better books of mares.
Gun Runner’s sire, Sweet Journey , is an efficient instance. After retiring to stud at a price of $10,000—the bottom at which he ever stood—he was represented by 4 first-crop, grade 1 winners, and regardless of having subsequent runners from crops conceived at charges of as much as $80,000, has by no means produced greater than two grade 1 winners in a single crop since. Three Chimneys stood an excessive instance in Slew o’ Gold, who sired seven of his 12 lifetime graded winners within the first two of his 17 Northern Hemisphere crops.
Turning to the feminine line, Early Voting traces to one of the notable basis mares from considered one of Virginia’s most famed nurseries, the Meadow Farm of Christopher T. Chenery. Though most celebrated because the birthplace of Secretariat in 1970, Meadow Farm was based a lot earlier, again in 1936, and Early Voting’s ancestress, Hildene, was among the many farm’s first mares. Solely positioned on the monitor, Hildene turned an exceptionally profitable broodmare. 5 of her sons gained stakes, they usually included Hill Prince, a champion at 2, 3, and 4, 1951 Horse of the Yr, and the Preakness Stakes winner of 1950; 1958 champion 2-year-old colt First Touchdown (whose son, Riva Ridge gained two legs of the Triple Crown in 1972, however might solely handle fourth on a moist monitor within the Preakness). A daughter of Hildene, Satsuma, produced one other nice runner in Cicada, champion 2-year-old filly of 1961, champion 3-year-old filly in 1962, and champion older mare in 1963.
One other of Hildene’s daughters, First Flush, did not win in three begins, however she additionally made her mark as a broodmare, and she or he seems as ancestress of greater than 100 stakes winners, 11 of them grade 1 (or winners of races at an equal stage previous to the appearance of the graded program). The department from which Early Voting stems comes down via First Flush’s stakes-winning daughter Copper Canyon (by Bryan G., additionally the sire of Cicada, making Copper Canyon a three-quarter sister to that mare). None of Copper Canyon’s offspring gained black-type occasions, however three of her daughters did produce grade 1 winners. The a number of grade 1-placed Copernica seems as dam of the Hopeful Stakes (G1) victor of 1987, Crusader Sword; Cherokee Phoenix is dam of the 1988 Flamingo Stakes (G1) winner Cherokee Colony; and the unraced Buckpasser mare Insilca is dam of the 1995 Turf Traditional Invitational Stakes (G1T) scorer, Turkpasser.
Irap as a foal along with his dam Silken Cat
Insilca additionally seems as dam of Silken Doll, and it is Silken Doll’s Storm Cat daughter Silken Cat, the champion 2-year-old filly in Canada for 1995, who’s the second dam of Early Voting. Silken Cat had already made a big impression earlier than the arrival of Early Voting, as her offspring embody 2004 champion sprinter and really profitable sire Speightstown ; Irap , winner of the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes (G2), Ohio Derby (G3), and Indiana Derby (G3) all in 2017, and in addition three-times positioned in grade 1 occasions; and to Cableknit, whose son Capezzano took the 2019 Al Maktoum Problem Spherical 3 Sponsored By Emirates Airways (G1). Early Voting’s dam, Amour d’Ete, by no means ran, however as a daughter of Tiznow, she’s a full sister to Irap.
Early Voting is the one starter for Gun Runner out of a Tiznow mare, however his sire, Sweet Journey, is represented by stakes winner Pretty Journey on the cross. The reverse cross, that of Tiznow over a Sweet Journey mare, got here up with the Hopeful Stakes (G1) winner of 2017, Sporting Likelihood . We’ll additionally be aware that Early Voting is considered one of six Gun Runner stakes winners, three graded, with inbreeding to Storm Cat, the sire of Gun Runner’s maternal grandsire, Big’s Causeway.
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