Bustino's Breeding Bits

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Here's the end of year First Season Sires. Not a great difference from the end of Turf season table, though Starman reinforced his position by ending with a 40% winners to runners ratio. It was remarkable that he did so well as his contestants had to run against those of Wootton Bassett, Havana Grey and Mehmas.
One has to applaud Lucky Vega for getting so many winners at such an excellent Winners to Runners ratio.
Also well dones to Lope Y Fernandez and St Mark's Basilica, the latter must surely have an even better second year.

Disappointment? Probably Palace Pier who made a great start to the year and then faded.

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2025 is over but in about 8 weeks the 2026 Flat Season starts with a whole bunch of new sires sending out their produce. Tough times for FSS as you have real star sires like Starman, Wootton Bassett, Havana Grey and Mehmas with lots of 2yos and a proven 2yo profile.
Top of the Bookies lists for becoming Champion FSS is Minzaal. According to the 2024 Return of Mares (November figures, so actual figures may be higher) he had at least 104 foals. A very speedy son of Mehmas he looks a possible for the title. He was a forward 2yo, so is expected to sire the same. He also had a lot of class. Second in the list (88 foals) is Blackbeard. Again he is by a previous FSS champion in No Nay Never. He was a better 2yo than Minzaal but not as good a 3yo. Next in line comes Persian Force (89) who is again by Mehmas and was very precocious winning the Brocklesby and later winning the July Stakes. He was 3rd to Blackbeard in the Middle Park. He only ran as a 2yo.
Next in the betting is Space Traveller (111) who had a thoroughly searching time on the racecourse running 24 times and winning 5 of them. This son of Bated Breath had his biggest day when winning the Jersey Stakes.
Next come Caturra, Naval Crown, Perfect Power, Baaeed and Stradivarius amongst others. Most interesting is Baaeed (96) who certainly got the numbers but is expected to have later developing sorts and he did not run as a 2yo.
Of course there has to be interest in Stradivarius (69). Like Baaeed, he is by Sea the Stars but, unlike Baaeed, he did run as a 2yo and in fact won an 8f all-weather maiden in November of his 2yo days. Baaeed’s harem is likely to be full of Black Type 8-14f mares. The Strad will not have many black type mares and some his produce will have been bred with the expectation of being NH horses. Interesting to compare them nonetheless.
Roll on late March.
 
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The Irish turf Flat Season begins today and the first race is a 2yo event which includes 2 entries by First Season Sires (FSS). By Persian Force is Force Noir and by Blackbeard is Equus Victor. The first of these trained by Robson Aguair, a Brazilian who has had 10 AW winners since starting up at the end of 2025. He actually has 4 runners in the race.

AOB runs 3 maidens later in the day.

Why are the UK not starting next Saturday? Again it's Cheltenham and Aintree pulling rank over the UK Turf Flat Season.
 
Ruler's Control gets the 2yo season off with a win. A €30,000 yearling purchase, he's by Territories and trained by Jack Foley. He and Force Noir, more or less, had the race between them with Force Noir losing the lead at the distance with Ruler's Control going near to a length ahead while running away to the left , away from the whip. In the last 50yds Force Noir came back strongly and was beaten only a head. Slow time in deep going it will be interesting to see if these two take the race well.
So Teritories goes to the top of the 2yo Sires leaderboard. Ruler's Court has a strong bottom line with his 5th dam being Chris Evert, who won 4 Grade 1 races as a 3yo. RC's dam is by Dansili, the grandam by Miswaki, great grandam by Nureyev: so a powerful line-up.
 
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Bustino74 said:
Ruler's Control gets the 2yo season off with a win. A €30,000 yearling purchase, he's by Territories and trained by Jack Foley. He and Force Noir, more or less, had the race between them with Force Noir losing the lead at the distance with Ruler's Control going near to a length ahead while running away to the left , away from the whip. In the last 50yds Force Noir came back strongly and was beaten only a head. Slow time in deep going it will be interesting to see if these two take the race well.
So Teritories goes to the top of the 2yo Sires leaderboard. Ruler's Court has a strong bottom line with his 5th dam being Chris Evert, who won 4 Grade 1 races as a 3yo. RC's dam is by Dansili, the grandam by Miswaki, great grandam by Nureyev: so a powerful line-up.
Click to expand...
OOoft look at the number of blue hen mares in the pedigree!
 
The UK's first 2yo race sees a brace of Persian Force colts both owned by Amo Racing. There's also a Caturra colt making his debut but that's it for FSS. Interesting runners from Hannon and Beckett.
 
The Hannon and Beckett runners have the finish between them. The winner, A Bear Affair, is by Kodi Bear and Beckett's Dance a Jig is by Naval Crown: both worth following. .
 
Magic Effort wins the maiden at Newmarket today and unless I've lost the ability to count it is the first winner by a FSS. That sire is Good Effort who didn't get a quote in the above list. He's now an 11yo and ran until he was a 7yo, winning 9 races from 35 starts. He's by Shamardal out of an american bred mare. He was trained By I Mohammed as is this winner.

Where did he come from?
 
FSS Bayside Boy (100-1 to be champion FSS) gets off the mark with a head victory at Newbury today. Bayside Boy was a pretty useful 2yo, winning the Champagne Stakes and finishing 3rd in the Dewhurst and Futurity. His day in the sun was his victory in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

His son, Blessed Voyager, traces back to Infra Red who most notably is an ancestor of Mill Reef.

His trainer Beckett seems to have some early 2yos.
 
This year the spotlight returned to Burrows. On the 5th September another full brother, Raaheeb, made his debut at Ascot and won comfortably from a moderate field (although difficult to say how moderate at this stage). He has no fancy entries but most probably will run once again this season. Will he take after Baaeed and/or Hukum in Class and preferred distance. It will be fascinating to watch.

Raaheeb looks pretty god and could be a Derby horse for Burrows.
 
Still no entries for Baaeed progeny as far as I can see. I guess that, because he was unraced as a 2YO, he is unlikely to get many early season 2YOs?
 
I'd say the mares sent to him have at least an equal contribution to the profile of the type of horses he'll produce. People paying 60,000 a pop aren't likely to be looking for a precocious 2yo.
Bated Breath didn't run as a 2yo yet produced some reasonable 2yos in his early seasons. More important could be why Baaeed didn't run. If he was injured as a 2yo he may not have run, so that would not affect the precocity of his offspring. If he was slow to come to hand that may have some effect. I'd expect to start seeing some 2yos by June.
 
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The descendants of Height of Fashion are queuing up to run in the Derby as Saxon Street wins the Blue Riband Trial at Epsom and gets a price of 20-1 for Epsom. His 5th dam is HoF and as he is by Deep Impact's son Saxon Warrior he is inbred 6 x 6 to Highclere.
 
Bow Echo's pedigree illustrates an interesting piece of in-breeding that is rare but thought to be useful by many pundits. His sire is Night of Thunder, who's a son of Dubawi. Dubawi's dam is Zomaradah (a daughter of Deploy). Bow Echo's dam is Aristocratic Lady, whose dam Dubian Queen is also out of Zomaradah. So Bow Echo is inbred 3 x 3 to Zomaradah.
We normally talk about in-breeding to Sires but this is in-breeding to a Mare.
 
Very early days but 100-1 shot (for the GBR/Ire title) Bayside Boy gets off to a good start.

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We might see Baaeed's first runner next Thursday - Shiyam out of Give And Take is entered in the 2.48 at Yarmouth for the Gosdens. The dam's best progeny to date has been the Frankel gelding Luther who has 3 wins from 8 runs and was rated 104 for Charlie Fellowes before heading off to the USA. Luther finished 4th in the French 2000 GNS and won on debut as a 2YO. It will be interesting to see if Shiyam runs.
 
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Thanks OddDog. Been offline for a few days and not up to speed.
I wrote about Give and Take a while ago on this thread. She's from the old Lord Howard de Walden family of Gryada, who eventually gave us Fame and Glory and Legatissimo.
Looks like Shadwell liked this one and picked it up from Nicholas Jones' Coln Valley Stud.
 
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Shiyam is indeed declared tomorrow at Yarmouth. I'd missed the fact that he was double entered on the card and he has been declared for the novice stakes at 3.23. At the time of writing he is 2nd fav at 10/3 behind the odds-on fav Al Hudaiba (already won at Newmarket on debut). I'd consider Shiyam worth a dabble.
 
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