Giant with a cause

When the Thoroughbred market went south in the late 1980s, American breeders turned en masse against foreign-raced stallions. Despite the fact that both American and European sire lists had been dominated by European-raced horses in the 1980s, despite the fact that horses like Blushing Groom (Fr), Caro (Ire), Riverman, Lyphard, *Vaguely Noble, and Nijinsky II were among the most commercially successful stallions with the highest stud fees of the decade, American commercial breeders decided that the solution to their problems was to stop breeding to foreign-raced horses and concentrate on American sires who had raced primarily or exclusively on dirt.

As a result, the only really high-class, European-raced horse I can think of imported to these shores for the last 20 years or so is Giant's Causeway. And, no, North Light does not count. He was an Epsom Derby winner in a substandard year. Perhaps a reader with a better memory can remind me of another really top European runner given a chance at stud over here in the last two decades?

So who is currently the leading sire in America, whether by worldwide or North American earnings only? Giant's Causeway of course.
Giant's Causeway did have certain advantages. Since he was by Storm Cat out of an American Grade 2 winner, Mariah's Storm, by Rahy, he was perceived as having a “dirt” pedigree. The best 10-furlong horse of his year in Europe, he had also performed brilliantly in his lone appearance on dirt, beaten only a head by Tiznow in the 2000 Breeders' Cup Classic (G1) at Churchill Downs.

Giant's Causeway also has had the advantage of covering enormous books of mares at Ashford Stud in Kentucky. His current $3.5-million lead over Tiznow on the worldwide earnings list is partly due to the fact that as of September 20, 2009, he has 327 runners this year compared to 144 for Tiznow. Distorted Humor, who is third has 255, while Fusaichi Pegasus, another Ashford sire who is generally considered a failure in the U.S., is fourth (mostly due to his Australian-sired runners) with 327 runners as well.

Giant's Causeway has also benefited from the evolution of American racing surfaces. Of the $54-million his offspring have earned worldwide to date, $33-million (61%) has been earned on turf. His offspring have earned $5.6-million of the remaining $21-million on synthetic surfaces. Thus, Giant's Causeway's progeny have earned 71.5% of their total earnings on surfaces other than dirt.

That certainly looks like a rock-solid confirmation that Giant's Causeway is not a dirt sire, but it may also be the result of something akin to a self-fulfilling prophecy. Owners and trainers expect the Giant's Causeways to be better on surfaces other than dirt and give them more opportunities on those surfaces.
What breeders, trainers and everyone else appear to have forgotten is that a truly top-class horse is usually a top-class horse on any surface. Yes, any horse can have slight preferences for firm going instead of soft, grass instead of dirt, synthetics, or any possible combination. But as a general rule, the differences are not that great, and most good horses will learn to adapt given the opportunity. With a wide range of opportunities these days, one cannot blame trainers for trying to run their horses on the surface they think is the very best for him.

Breeders have also forgotten that throughout the history of American breeding top-class European-raced horses have repeatedly transformed the American Thoroughbred. Imported sires dominated American sire lists for decades until Americans basically stopped breeding to them in the late 1980s.

Last week at the Keeneland September yearling sale, I asked a prominent European buyer why he had all but stopped buying in America. The answer was simple. Current European sires—Galileo, Montjeu, Pivotal, Oasis Dream, Monsun, Dansili—are simply better than current American sires. Their offspring do not require drugs to run. They produce a higher percentage of Grade 1 winners. And they win in America, while American-sired horses seldom win major races in Europe anymore.

Thirty years ago, Claiborne Farm, Gainesway, and other American breeding farms would have been in hot pursuit of Europe's current wonder horse Sea The Stars.

Does anyone believe they have any real interest these days?

Seeing Stars?

2009 may be the year of Rachel Alexandra in the U.S., but many European pundits believe they also have an all-time great on the scene in Sea The Stars. The handsome Cape Cross colt scored his fifth consecutive Group 1 win of the season on Saturday, beating Irish Derby winner Fame and Glory in the Irish Champion S.

The Irish Champion was Sea The Stars's seventh consecutive victory in his eight starts—he finished a green fourth in his first start behind two subsequent stakes winners and this year's Dante S. second.

Each of Sea The Stars's seven wins has been characterized by an ability to cruise along behind the leaders and then unleash a dramatic, decisive turn of foot in the final furlong. The Irish Champion was no different. Aidan O'Brien has been trying to beat Sea The Stars all season and he threw two pacemakers and two of his three best 3-year-olds at Sea The Stars on Saturday.

The pacemakers set a very fast pace over yielding ground with Ballydoyle's 2008 champion juvenile and '09 dual Group 1 winner Mastercraftsman cruising in third. On the turn, Johnny Murtaugh moved Ballydoyle's first string, Fame and Glory up on the outside of Sea The Stars with the obvious intention of getting first run and testing the champion's stamina to the fullest.

It didn't matter...Mick Kinane on Sea The Stars merely followed Fame and Glory through, then simply sprinted past with 100 yards to go, winning by 2 ½ lengths. The performance reminded me a lot of Sir Ivor's performances in the 1968 Epsom Derby and Washington D.C. International. In each case, the winner made some of the fastest horses in the world look slow with a remarkable turn of foot.

That ability to accelerate in a stride or two at the end of a race and produce an 11-second furlong is very rare and it is always visually impressive. But what does it actually mean in terms of form? British turf writers are comparing Sea The Stars favorably to *Sea-Bird and Brigadier Gerard, the two highest-rated horses in the history of the authoritative Timeform ratings. *Sea-Bird earned a 145 (pounds) rating in 1965 and Brigadier Gerard was rated 144 in 1972. *Tudor Minstrel also received a 144 in 1947, but that is apparently so long ago that no one cares anymore, or perhaps everyone but us curmudgeons has forgotten.

Brigadier Gerard won 17 of 18 starts from 1970-72, beaten only by Roberto under an all time great ride by Braulio Baeza in the '72 Benson and Hedges Gold Cup. In the 1972 2,000 Guineas, Brigadier Gerard beat another all-time great, Mill Reef, by three lengths. Mill Reef, who needed a longer distance to be at his very best, was rated 141 by Timeform.

*Sea-Bird won 7 of 8 starts in 1964-65 with a visually impressive style very similar to that of Sea The Stars. In the 1965 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, *Sea-Bird beat Reliance by six lengths with *Diatome five lengths further away third, accumulating all of that record-equaling margin in the last furlong and a half with a devastating turn of speed. Reliance had won all of his previous races including the French Derby, and *Diatome subsequently scored a comfortable victory in the D.C. International. Timeform rated Reliance 137, Diatome 132.

It is clear from those details that *Sea-Bird and Brigadier Gerard earned their high ratings through performance, but, realistically, what kind of rating has Sea The Stars actually earned this year? In succession, he has beaten Delegator by 1 ½ lengths in the 2,000 Guineas, Fame and Glory by 1 ¾ lengths in the Epsom Derby-G1, Rip van Winkle by a length in the Eclipse, Mastercraftsman by a length in the Juddmonte International, and Fame and Glory by 2 ½ lengths at Leopardstown.
Those are all good horses, and worthy classic horses in an average year, but with the possible, marginal exception of Rip van Winkle, does anyone really believe that any of those horses he has beaten is worth much more than 132 or 133 on the Timeform scale?

No, I didn't think so.

Clearly, Sea The Stars is a great racehorse, the best we have seen in Europe in more than a decade, but *Sea-Bird? The Brigadier? Mill Reef? Not yet anyway. On paper at least, he has consistently produced a performance worth somewhere between about 134 and 138 on the Timeform scale, where a length translates into about 2 pounds. That's in the Timeform ballpark occupied by such as Nijinsky II and *Vaguely Noble, which is heady enough territory for almost any horse.

Consistency is admirable, but it is not the same thing as absolute, all-time great ability. The all-time greats, the *Sea-Birds, the *Ribots (Timeform 142), the Secretariats, are capable of completely running away from rivals who have proven themselves to be racehorses of the 132 to 135 class on the Timeform scale.

Good as he is, Sea The Stars has not yet done that.

They don't call me the Pedigree Curmudgeon for nothing.

It depends on what "is" is

Every time a yearling by Tiznow came into the sales ring during the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale of selected yearlings, announcer Terrence Collier repeated that Tiznow was then the leading sire in North America.

Well, that depends on your definition of “North America.”

No, I am not being Clintonesque here.

Collier was quoting the general sire list published on the website of the Blood-Horse magazine. The question is, exactly what is that sire list based on? Which countries' race results are included in that list? The United States and Canada? Mexico? Puerto Rico? Any other countries?

The Blood-Horse website does not tell you, but unless their standards have changed in the last few years, their “North American” sire list includes money earned in the five major European racing countries (England, Ireland France, Germany, Italy), plus the United Arab Emirates....but not Japan or other major racing venues. (Presumably the standards are listed in the weekly magazine sire lists, but the author is not a subscriber, so perhaps one of our readers can enlighten us?).

In fact, there is no way that Tiznow could have been atop the North American sire list at that point without the earnings of Well Armed in the Dubai World Cup-G1. In fact, if one restricts the sire list to earnings in North America only (U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico, but not Mexico), then Tiznow currently stands in 20th place on the North American sire list, and could not possibly have been in first place the second week in August.

The Thoroughbred Times website is at least more informative. (Full disclosure—the author still works part time for Thoroughbred Times and is certainly biased in their favor). Giant's Causeway stands almost $3-million clear of Tiznow, who ranks second on that list (and indeed Giant's Causeway was well clear at the time of the Saratoga sale on the Thoroughbred Times list), which is based on earnings in North America, plus 17 other countries, including Japan. The Thoroughbred Times list includes earnings in all 18 countries (including the US) for which the Jockey Club database includes complete racing data.

At the very least, that is a far more logical approach than the Blood-Horse's inclusion of only North America, Europe and the UAE. Both magazines began including Europe in the late 1980s as the data became available. Everybody added the UAE when Cigar won the first Dubai World Cup in 1996. How could you possibly not include the complete earnings of the all-time leading American-trained money-earner?

The Blood-Horse decided, however, that they would not include Japanese earnings even when they became readily available. Supposedly the rationale at the time was that Japanese purses were so high that they would in some way “skew” the results.

Bullhockey!

I fail to see the logic of including some purses that are markedly higher than North American purses (as in Dubai) and excluding others (namely Japan). It seems to me the only argument concerning a leading North American sire list should be whether one includes only earnings in North America or one includes everything available.
One can argue either side of that question, but I have yet to see a valid argument for anything in between.

For the record (courtesy of Thoroughbred Times database...It's available, but they don't run it on their website), here are the current top ten sires by North American earnings only, as of 9/3/09:


Sire Strs Wnrs SWs Total Earnings
Giant's Causeway 142 62 11 $5,886,465
A.P. Indy 126 62 13 5,710,951
Medaglia d'Oro 95 43 7 5,647,349
Distorted Humor 217 108 11 5,500,685
Smart Strike 193 78 10 5,141,563
Stormy Atlantic 234 99 13 4,638,666
Unbridled's Song 153 61 9 4,623,808
Tale of the Cat 201 88 8 4,535,586
Birdstone 50 24 4 4,302,615
Malibu Moon 205 84 10 4,149,495
Empire Maker 100 47 4 3,985,213
Yes It's True 219 120 4 3,971,007
Northern Afleet 204 113 4 3,888,482
Dynaformer 111 45 6 3,795,177
Yonaguska 171 91 5 3,781,409
Unusual Heat 130 61 7 3,727,213
Pulpit 153 68 6 3,707,677
Lemon Drop Kid 115 66 12 3,658,110
Not For Love 196 87 8 3,657,464
Tiznow 125 54 6 3,600,042

Cultural bias

If they both retired to stud tomorrow, which horse would command the higher stud fee, Summer Bird or Quality Road?

The correct answer is Quality Road. Why? Well it is mostly based on industry biases and seemingly permanent, almost willful misconceptions about what is important in determining the stud potential of top colts.

Remember five years ago when Smarty Jones and Birdstone retired to stud? Smarty had won a minor stakes at two, the Kentucky Derby-G1 on a bad track that blatantly favored runners near the front of the pack, and the Preakness-G1 at three. Birdstone had won a G1 (the Champagne) at two, beaten Smarty Jones in the Belmont-G1 and won the Travers-G1 at three. Smarty Jones began his stud career at a stud fee of $100,000. Birdstone started off at $10,000.

Both were rather small, unimpressive individuals, correct enough, but not physical specimens who would have brought high prices at yearling or juvenile sales, regardless of their pedigrees. Three Chimneys had a waiting list for Smarty Jones, despite his high stud fee, but Gainesway struggled to fill Birdstone's book. Eighty-five foals resulted for Smarty's first crop versus only 70 for Birdstone.

True, part of the reason for the discrepancy in stud fee and book size was Smarty Jones's popularity with the racing public. The main reason, though, was pedigree. Smarty was from Elusive Quality's first crop, and the latter was a beautifully bred horse who had made himself a salable entity, mainly because of Smarty. Birdstone was by Grindstone, a better racehorse than Elusive Quality, but a proven failure at stud, Birdstone excepted. Birdstone possessed the better female family, but breeders did not care. Though not everyone was sold on Smarty's potential, breeders were willing to take a chance, banking on his presumed commercial appeal.

The results, of course, speak for themselves. Smarty's first crop includes, to date, only two minor stakes winners. Birdstone's first crop features five stakes winners, including two of the three best 3yo colts of the year, Summer Bird and Mine That Bird. In retrospect, Birdstone had everything breeders should require--except an impressive physique--in a stallion prospect...mainly his race record. He was a Grade 1 winner at two and a classic winner and Travers winner at 3. What more should one want? (Full disclosure--the author turned down Birdstone for a client's mare, despite an excellent pedigree match because of his size and unimpressive physique. He has since come to his senses).

Since then, of course, Elusive Quality has sired Raven's Pass and other top runners, confirming his quality as a stallion. Quality Road is a big, impressive individual from a very high-class family, and he has established track records at both 6 1/2 and 9 furlongs. Summer Bird is a good-looking, medium-sized horse, unraced at two, who has won two of the four most important races for three-year-olds and is from the same family as top sires Relaunch and Tapit. Either of these colts may yet go on to secure the 3yo male championship and earn a more lucrative stud career, but right now, Quality Road would be the choice of most breeders because he is perceived as the horse with superior speed.

Life just is not fair, whether one speaks of racehorses or of men. But which horse will have the higher stud fee in 2010, Smarty Jones or Birdstone?

Let's be honest about it

It has been a difficult month.

The cliché about death and taxes has been too true of late. We've had too much of the former and face too much of the latter on receivables that haven't even been collected yet due to the economic recession, presumably. Time to move on.

Let's see....several recent events that deserve comment.

Yes, the Saratoga select sale was up, but the results were a bit deceiving...though happily so. The catalog—meaning both the pedigrees and the individuals—were at least 30% better than in 2008, but average price rose only 10%. Does that mean that the level of the market was actually down 20%?

Well, that's probably not fair. In a sense it's not even fair to compare the two sales. Fasig-Tipton's new ownership made a new beginning at Saratoga with their renovations to the area behind the pavilion and recruitment of a more international catalog and buyers bench. Consignors sensed something positive was happening and sent better horses with better pedigrees, and more of them.

Saratoga 2009 proved that in a shrinking market a boutique sale could work once again. The line for entries to the 2010 sale is already forming. The danger for Fasig-Tipton will be the temptation to take too many horses too soon. Give it time. Give it room to breathe and grow naturally.

One small incident on the last day of the sale bothered me a bit. Fasig-Tipton put Man o' War on the cover and used his image and reputation in their advertising. There is only one small problem with that. Man o' War was sold at Saratoga, but not by Fasig-Tipton. I knew that at least some FT officials knew that to be true, and when I mentioned the fact to Dan Pride, the company's new chief operating officer, he agreed and pointed out that nowhere in the advertising, etc., did it say that the horse was sold by Fasig-Tipton. He implied that any misconception was in the eye of the beholder and was not the fault of the company. Well.....no.

I like Dan Pride, a fellow Tennessean, a lot. His presence has added a lot of energy and a focus on classy presentation to the company's sales.....but misleading advertising is not classy. Sorry my friend Dan, but I do not believe that kind of advertising is as classy as the product the company aspires to sell.

I like Rachel Alexandra a lot too, and she is obviously a very classy filly. Her time figures and margins of victory have proven that she might be a truly great filly. But the emphasis at this point should be on “might”. The rest of this crop of three-year-old fillies is clearly far short of inspiring. None of the top three-year-old colts have yet faced their elders, so it is impossible to say with any certainty at this point just how much credit she should get for a six-length beating of Summer Bird.

The rush by much of the racing press to crown her as an all-time great, therefore, is a bit embarrassing. Is racing so desperate for heroes that we have to over-hype every good horse that comes along? (For example....Curlin—truly not picking on Jess Jackson here, pure happenstance of ownership) Unrealistic, excessive press is just as bad as no press at all. It sets up the public for one more huge disappointment if Rachel Alexandra ever falls short of those unrealistic expectations.

But if comparisons to Ruffian or even Dark Mirage and Desert Vixen are premature, it is clear she is a very good filly. Racing should certainly take advantage, as best we can, of her brilliance, but, I would offer the same advice to racing's promoters I'd offer Dan Pride (equally unsolicited).

Let's be honest about it.

The sire of sires effect

I rarely participate in discussions on internet bulletin boards. In part that is a holdover from the time when I was a full-time employee of Thoroughbred Times. Anything I said at that time could have been interpreted as representing Thoroughbred Times, and that would not do at all, so I simply never commented, even in cases of factual error.

Three-plus years into the semi-retirement it is nice to feel the freedom implicit in “freelance”. I am still not inclined to comment frequently in online forums, whether on Thoroughbred racing or other obsessions, because too frequently they turn into flame wars that benefit no one.

Occasionally, however, the urge to correct factual errors or potentially misleading statements overpowers that probably wise reticence. One recent discussion on the tb_breeding_theory board on Yahoo brought me reluctantly out of my curmudgeon cave, brandishing facts.

The discussion began with a question about the comparative rarity of inbreeding to Northern Dancer through his daughters. That eventually led to a broad generalization by one member (a good guy who I doubt intended it the way it came out) that implied that great sires of sires, including Northern Dancer, were not good broodmare sires.
Since I knew the inference that might be drawn from that statement was untrue, I felt duty-bound to step into the fray, and produced the following lists of the accomplishments as broodmare sires of some of the sires mentioned (the sires of sires are in bold face, the produce of their daughters in red--damn I hate that I don't know HTML code!):

Phalaris Among leading BMS England
Picture Play 1,000 Guineas, great foundation broodmare
Mid-day Sun Epsom Derby, champion 3yo
Godiva Epsom Oaks, 1,000 Guineas, ch 3yo filly
Windsor Slipper Undefeated Irish Triple Crown winner, ch 2yo, 3yo
Emborough Leading sire Australia
Delville Wood Leading sire Australia
Enfield Among leading sires Australia
Brown Betty 1,000 Guineas
Sind Leading sire Argentina
*Easton Coronation Cup, good sire
Plassy Good SW, sire of Vandale
Burudun Leading sire Argentina

Nearco Leading BMS England 3 times, leading BMS France
*Prince Taj Leading sire in France twice
Rising Flame Leading BMS Japan, among leading sires Japan
*Arctic Prince Epsom Derby, good sire
Averof Leading sire South Africa
Tamerlane St. James's Palace S., Grandsire of Monsun
Count Rendered Among leading sires NZ
*Khorassan II Among leading sires Aus/NZ
*Miralgo Champion 2yo England
*Tulyar Epsom Derby, St. Leger, champion 3yo
Saint Crespin III Arc, among leading sires England
Forest Row Leading broodmare sire Chile
*Vaguely Noble Arc, leading sire England
Charlottesville French Derby, Leading sire England
Sheshoon Ascot Gold Cup, Leading sire France
*Aggressor II King George VI and Queen Elizabeth S.
Ambergris Irish Oaks,
*Rose Royale II 1,000 Guineas, ch. 3yo filly
Sybil's Nephew Leading sire South Africa
Test Case ch. 2yo colt England, among leading sires NZ

*Nasrullah among leading BMS US 5 times
Boucher St. Leger
Poker Broodmare sire of Seattle Slew, Silver Charm
Turkish Trousers ch. 3yo filly
Tell Sire of good NZ sire Pompeii Court
Talking Picture ch. 2yo filly, great broodmare
Pakistan Leading sire NZ
Hornbeam Leading BMS England
*Sovereign champion 2yo filly England
Lacquer Irish 1,000 Guineas
Drumtop Great turf filly, dam of Topsider

Bold Ruler among the leading BMS US twice (7 champions, 119 SW)
Christmas Past champion 3yo filly
Intrepid Hero Hollywood Derby, United Nations H.
Sovereign Dancer Among leading sires, sire of Louis Quatorze, Gate Dancer
Quick as Lightning 1,000 Guineas
Posse St. James's Palace S., good sire in England
Intrepidity Epsom Oaks, Prix Vermeille
Autobiography Champion older horse
Targowice Leading sire France
Home Guard 2nd leading BMS Italy, good sire

Northern Dancer Leading BMS US (5 champions, 159 SW)
Tap Dance City Takarazuka Kinen, $9.5-million
Vega champion 3yo filly Japan
Muhtarram champion older horse, underrated sire
Eillo Breeders' Cup Sprint
Silk Prima Donna Japanese Oaks
Ryafan champion turf mare
Rhythm champion 2yo colt,
Not for Love good Maryland sire
Arazi champion 2yo
Noverre champion miler
Aptitude champion older horse
L'Enjoleur Canadian HOTY
Southern Halo 8-time leading sire Argentina, sire of More Than Ready
L'Alezane Canadian HOTY
Narita Brian Japanese Triple Crown winner
Ravinella 1,000 Guineas
Signal Tap Successful sire in Brazil
Nedawi St. Leger, among leading sires Brazil

Bold Ruler excepted, all those horses rank among the greatest broodmare sires of the 20th century. They were not, on the other hand, particularly successful as
broodmare sires of sires....at least not in the obvious sense. If you read over those lists, you will notice that all of them sired the dams of leading sires--just not in areas where their own sons were dominant sires. For example, the only great sire out of a Northern Dancer mare is Southern Halo, who was dominant in Argentina, but, More Than Ready excepted, failed in the US. Only one Northern Dancer-line horse (the mostly moderate Oak Dancer) has ever led the Argentine sire list.

So what might account for that fact? It seems logical that when a sire becomes accepted as a great sire of sires and large numbers of his sons go to stud in a given area, those sons make it very difficult for sons of daughters of that same sire of sires to gain any traction as sires. For example, Northern Dancer had so many great sons at stud that breeding those sons to sires out of daughters of Northern Dancer would create inbreeding closer than most breeders are willing to accept.

On the other hand, in a breeding area where sons of that sire of sires have not penetrated the gene pool, there is room, as it were, for the genetic influence of the sire of sires to be passed on through his daughters. Thus, Southern Halo could become a dominant factor in Argentina, a country where male-line descendants have enjoyed markedly less success than almost anywhere else on the globe.

I'm not sure myself exactly what I think of this hypothesis. It's something I'll be mulling in the nether reaches of the brain stem for awhile, but, if true, the implications are obvious for stallion importers in regional markets.

Vuillier and the Triple Crown

Before they proved they were top-class runners, the pedigrees of the three winners of America's 2009 Triple Crown races would not have been described as fashionable. Indeed, Mine That Bird famously sold for only $9,500 as a yearling, while neither Rachel Alexandra or Summer Bird were offered at public auction.
Fashion be damned. As shown by the data below (please forgive my ignorance of how to make the columns come out neatly in HTML code), their pedigrees are actually well within the norm of contemporary top-class pedigrees.


Archetype Mine That Bird Rachel Alexandra Summer Bird
Blue Larkspur(100) 56 88 104
Bold Ruler(157) 128 128 128
Buckpasser(108) 32 0 160
Hail to Reason(94) 0 256 0
*Mahmoud(118) 104 168 152
Man o' War(116) 108 132 168
Mr. Prospector(256)640 256 128
*Nasrullah(243) 240 144 208
Native Dancer(199)352 224 256
Nearco(279) 280 280 288
Northern Dancer(296) 512 512 640
Phalaris(178) 170 218 164
Plucky Liege(118) 111 148 125
*Princequillo(151) 144 160 192
*Ribot(75) 0 192 0
Seattle Slew(120) 0 0 0
War Admiral(85) 60 56 136

The data presented above are based on research by the author on a new implementation of the Vuillier dosage system published in the December 13, 2008 issue of Thoroughbred Times. The dosage numbers in parentheses represent the average genetic contribution of the archetypes listed to the pedigrees of the winners of the most important races in America since the institution of the Breeders' Cup in 1984. (You can read the article by clicking on the link titled “A new understanding of Vuillier dosage” on the right hand side of the page.) The numbers in the three unfortunately jagged columns are the dosages of the same archetypes in the pedigrees of Mine That Bird, Rachel Alexandra and Summer Bird.
The archetypes chosen for display here are actually the ones that produce the most varied dosages among these three pedigrees—their pedigrees are virtually identical on the other most significant influences on contemporary pedigrees. Indeed they are close to identical on a few of the archetypes included here as examples, like Bold Ruler, Nearco and Seattle Slew.
Naturally the widest variations in dosage are on the youngest archetypes listed, like Buckpasser, Hail to Reason, Mr. Prospector, Northern Dancer, *Ribot and Seattle Slew. That is the way pedigrees work. The genetic influence of the most significant sires and dams gradually stabilizes as time passes and their names recede further into the background of pedigrees.
The Vuillier system, though, gives a holistic view of pedigrees and offers tremendous insight into the direction one should take with matings.
For example, the pedigrees of Rachel Alexandra and Summer Bird are complementary in many ways. Rachel is above the norm in Hail to Reason, *Mahmoud, Phalaris, Plucky Liege and *Ribot, while Summer Bird is either below the norm or at least lower than Rachel in all five of those influences. Conversely, Summer Bird is high in Blue Larkspur, Buckpasser, Man o' War and *Princequillo, while Rachel's pedigree is less saturated with those powerful influences.
In a conventional pedigree presentation, it is easy to see that both Rachel Alexandra and Summer Bird have plenty of Northern Dancer and Mr. Prospector in their pedigrees, but it is simply impossible to see the imbalances in more distant but still vitally important ancestors. The Vuillier system makes those imbalances obvious.
The Vuillier system is based on the assumption that a mating that produces a pedigree more similar to the pedigree of the winners of the best races is more likely to produce another winner of those same races than one that does not. Indeed that is the same assumption behind other popular mating systems like nicking and even biomechanics (in an indirect way).
That is the beauty of the Vuillier system, and the implementation I devised with the help of Simon Morris at TesioPower and described in the linked article. It provides the ultimate in flexibility in applying those insights.