Like father, like son.....first-season sire guesses (and beyond)

Great thread, I was surprised Coolmore didn't hold on to Archipenko given his breeding. Yeats will turn Coolmore NH very quickly, just all wrong for the commercial game.

Mastercraftsman was supposed to be a bit gangly(on the leg I think they call it) and not the best looking horse. Good precocious 2-y-o, but best in a bog and I'm not expecting much.

Dandy Man has made a great start. Cape cross isn't proven as a sire of sires and this back-end should tell a lot for STS. Bushranger has had the numbers on the ground and I would have expected him to have made more of an impact.

I don't have a real in-depth knowledge Royal academy, but would find the industry very interesting. Pity for Yeats as it is very hard to come back once the NH label is stamped on you. If a good owner breeder has real faith in him, he might manage to produce a good horse, but he'll never be a real factor as whatever he does produce is not going to be rushed you'd imagine. Him and his type are good for the breed at the least.

Buy Yeats foals and yearlings they will be ideal for 4yo points and bumpers.

A very interesting piece  R.A.....Much thought went into it and i hope it receives the response it deserves .My own overall view of those horses you put up as f/season sires , are slightly in the negative , especially  Bushranger , who had if i remember correctly had a huge number of foals to represent him , and was the talk of the sales ring , he seemed to have everything in his favor according to breeders , or maybe it was the same sellers who tried and succeeded , to hype him up  , Dandyman , I have to admit is a horse i could never take to when he was racing , He promised so much yet seldom delivered .Another who was very well supported in his first season , the old saying springs to mind regarding both these fellows , fire enough arrows and one is bound to hit the target , Mastercraftsman is a horse i liked from the moment i saw him on a racecourse . As Neill d said , he was not the prettiest , yet he gave his all , a horse willing to go the extra mile , He never knew when he was beat , He kept battling away right to the line , full of tenacity and a born winner , I'd be hoping like yourself that come autumn and some cut in the ground his winners to runners will improve , He deserves his chance . Archipenco is a horse i'd find it very hard to send even a reasonable mare to , His pedigree is fine , in fact its excellent ,the shear fact that Coolmore let it go sways me against it to some degree ...They would have noted something not quite right , maybe temperamentally , and decided they wanted nothing to do with him , I don't know weather  it was due to fertility problems or maybe he was just late to stud , but 46 foals in this day and age doesn't augur well ..A horse who i would really like to see doing really well is SDS .One of the greatest i have ever seen on a racecourse , a smashing looking horse . One of those very rare types , a horse of presence , He walked around the parade ring as if he owned the place , Only the great ones can give you that feeling .With the kind of mares this fellow has got , I think it would be an act of cruel luck only that would prevent him reaching the top ...Finally we come to another great of recent times Yeats ...If only this fellow could be transported back 200 yrs ..He would be up there with the immortals ..Four gold cups , derby trails etc , year after year turning out wonderful performances , and the odd not so good ones .Here was the horses all TRUE breeders should be clamoring to send their mares to . How ironic then that the very establishment that heralded the notion that speed was everything should end up standing him at stud ..Surely a case of shooting yourself in the foot ..It looks as if He'll struggle to end up with many 2 yo winners , but is surely one for the long hard road , and i for one wish him all the best no matter were , or as what He stands as , to me he will always be a winner ...Good luck with your venture  Royal Academy as I already i hope it receives the responses it deserves ....

One word of caution about STS wildman, I remember reading somewhere that he doesn't seem to be 'stamping' his stock and that a lot of them tend to be taking after the mare. Just something to maybe watch out for if you were ever backing one of his first time. The fact that they all seem to be back-end sorts could give lie to this though, as he surely would've gotten plenty of speedy precocious mares.I thought we'd have seen 1 or 2 more of his by now, little worrying?

Update on Sea The Stars:

To date, there have been 8 STS runners and it’s no surprise that every pedigree is closely connected with Group or Grade One form. Eight runners have yielded two winners to date (both over 7f) from 15 starts and I would suggest that already these horses are crying out for trips in excess of a mile. They have tended to need their first outing and have been slowish to make it to the track; this in spite of the fact that some of their dams have had plenty of speed up close on the page.


Off very little conclusive evidence there is a slight concern that a couple of them (Calorie and Sea The Skies) have shown some wayward tendencies on their third start but its very early days for any empirical pattern to emerge.


My pick of the runners to date have been:

J Murtagh’s Calorie (filly): there’s loads of pace in this pedigree so, that in itself, poses a puzzle. Andrew Tinkler bought the mare (2006 Oasis Dream) out of training in 2009 for £540,000 (she was a dual 5f winner (including listed) for Tommy Stack and Ric Barnes) and she, in turn, is out of a G2 Prix Robert Papin (5.5f) winner.

Three 7f runs to date and she met with interference on her first, inconclusive start and was backed to win a late June Curragh maiden but from an outside draw Murtagh decided to make all the running and she was eventually beaten into third by Avenue Gabriel (subsequently G2 & G3 placed) and Ballybacka Queen (second at Galway and won Tipp maiden). Wachman’s Fly To The Moon (10th) and Ballydoyle’s Terrific (12th) both won on their next starts.

McCullagh visibly restrained her at Galway-probably to her detriment as she fought for her head-and this was a regressive run compared to her second start. The Racing Post suggested dropping her to 6f but I’m not so sure. She’s still in the Moyglare and the Shadwell Mile and I nominated her on my earlier 2yo thread.

Her second start definitely suggests she will win races and the debate will be over what trip and how best to ride her. It will be an early test for her rookie trainer if he can find the key to unlock her talent. I’ll be surprised if Murtagh is not on board for the foreseeable future.

Moyglare’s Afternoon Sunlight (D Weld): highlighted by wildman after her run last weekend which was certainly eye-catching. Smullen was easy enough on her and never used his whip. She is a half-sister to Weld’s 2009 10.5f Tattersalls Gold Cup winner Casual Conquest and will probably win a Leopardstown maiden soon enough.

Casual Smile (Andrew Balding): this filly is owned by the legendary Will Farish and is out of Farish’s 2003 Oaks winner Casual Look-also trained by Andrew Balding (who can forget Claire's tears of joy???)-who has previously bred a few decent winners.

Casual Smile ran in a decent fillies maiden at Newmarket last week, finishing second behind a very nice winner in Night Song. Unusually for a UK race commentary the race commentator entirely missed this filly throughout the race only naming her once the race was over. She ran a race of huge promise in a contest that has produced decent fillies in the past. To my eyes, this was probably the best and most promising performance of any Sea The Stars son or daughter to date. As she is not trained by trainer likely to over-influence the market she might be a nice price in her quest for a maiden.

Anipa (filly) – owned by Hesmonds Stud and trained by Ed Dunlop: progressive after just two runs and looking likely to win a maiden. Her half-sister is a Grade 1 10f winner in the US. She’ll be a valuable proposition if she could win a maiden.

A horse with some promise also is David Lanigan’s Placidia who is trained for the handler’s main patron Bjorn Nielsen-a hedge fund moneybags. The dam has produced some very smart sorts in the past, especially her first four foals from 1998-2001, but recent representatives have been a bit disappointing despite visits to Sadler’s Wells and Galileo. However Placidia improved enormously yesterday on her second start at Kempton and hinted at plenty more to come-probably over distances of 1m+.

John Oxx runs My Titania tonight at Leopardstown and this is what I wrote about her last May:

My Titania (filly by Sea The Stars)

Compared to the tightly-held Coolmore families it can be relatively easy to buy into the Aga Khan lines as he has regular culling sessions annually. Darabaka (by Doyoun) was one such sale and she was bought by Pat Fitzsimon’s Oak Lodge Stud in 1994 for £15,000 as an unraced “cull” from the Aga Khan’s Stud. She was carrying a cover to the modest Pharly and this foal was sold on for just £5,000. This horse was a prolific (albeit modest) two-miler for Mark Prescott but helped to make the mare. The mare produced four more winners including the 1996 Night Shift filly Sassenach who was bought by Sunderland Holdings’ David Tsui (the family of Sea The Stars fame) and she managed to win a 13f Downpatrick maiden for Michael Grassick from just two starts.

Sassenach, in turn, produced four winners for Tsui including a 12f Galileo Grade 3 winner in the US and Fairy Of The Night (by Danehill) who managed a very valuable 7f Listed win for Oxx and Tsui. The above 2yo filly, My Titania, represents Fairy Of The Night’s fourth foal and the only other sibling to run, Aneedah (by Invincible Spirit) was sold by the INS (who manage the Tsui operation) for €100,000 and she won over 8f and was listed placed for John Gosden.

My Titania is an early March foal and represents the first crop of the superstar racehorse that was Sea The Stars who has yet to have his first runner on the track. Just because his first-crop 2yo’s have not been seen by late May doesn’t necessarily signify that the stallion will shortly be a good bet for national hunt duty.

Yesterday’s Irish Times reported:
Owner Christopher Tsui sees the first progeny of Sea The Stars take the track in his colours as My Titania makes her racecourse bow at Leopardstown on Thursday.
Sea The Stars won six Group Ones for Tsui back in 2009 and his first crop of runners have hit the racecourse this summer, with two of his 10 starters winning so far.
Tsui and Sea The Stars' trainer John Oxx have yet to team up with one of their great horse's sons or daughters, but My Titania will get the ball rolling in the Irish Stallion Farms European Breeders Fund Fillies Maiden.
"She is a nice filly having her first run and hopefully she will come on for it," said Oxx.
"Like everybody else we would like a bit of rain and good ground. This is a nice start for her, though there are a couple with good placed form, including David Wachman's Three D Alexander who was third to Tapestry (subsequent Debutante Stakes winner).
"My Titania is quite precocious. Plan A was for her to be out a few months ago, but for one reason or another that didn't happen so she is out later."

Oxx’s debutants usually need the run and this remark even applied to Sea The Stars.

you was right about mastercraftsman, group 1 winner on saturday