Monday, January 18th, 2010
By Jack Werk
When we at Werk Thoroughbred Consultants, Inc. were planning the mating of the Smart Strike colt Lookin at Lucky (out if a Belong to Me mare) a few years ago, we were confident that Smart Strike and Belong to Me (both standing at Lane’s End) would work well together, even though there were no such stakes winners from this cross at the time. However, the Mr. Prospector/Danzig cross was an obviously potent combination.
- Lane’s End’s Smart Strike
We weren’t the only ones working with this idea, because the now-4-year-old Smart Strike colt Papa Clem, who won the G2 San Fernando Stakes at Santa Anita at 1 1/16 miles Saturday and the G3 Arkansas Derby last year, is bred exactly the same way! He was bred by his owner, Bo Hirsch, who was probably thinking along the same lines as we were. Great minds think alike!
I am joking, of course, because as anyone associated with breeding racehorses knows, getting a stakes winner is about one of the most statistically difficult things to do in racing! Your chances are helped a lot if you have a serious stallion to work with, and that’s exactly what Smart Strike is: A serious sire of racehorses! He stands for $75,000 in 2010, a major drop from his 2009 fee which was $125,000, and that means he’s great value this year! Don’t forget, this is the same stallion that led the sire list in 2007 and 2008 and was the leading sire of 2009 by US earnings. His son Curlin was also the Horse of the Year the last two years, in 2007 and 2008! Curlin now stands at Lane’s End alongside his sire and was recently represented by his first foal.
Smart Strike is the sire of 70 SWs, which is an incredible 9% stakes winners from foals – just the same percentage as Indian Charlie (my previous blog post), who stands for $70,000. A son of Mr. Prospector out of Canadian champion Classy ‘n Smart, by Smarten, Smart Strike won 6 of 8 starts, including the G1 Philip H. Iselin Handicap at 1 1/16 miles. He went to stud for a $30,000 fee but his sales horses were not that well received early on. Nevertheless, he did sire racehorses, and that’s what Smart Strike is really known for. His colts are especially good, and he can get you a champion 2-year-old like Lookin at Lucky, a classic-winning 3-year-old or champion older horse like Curlin, a top grass horse like English Channel, or top sprinters like Fabulous Find and Soaring Free! Interestingly, while Smart Strike’s 62 unrestricted SWs are divided equally between fillies (31) and colts (31), 7 of his 8 G1 winners are colts.
What I’ve found – and what horsemen have told me – is that the Smart Strikes are dead-game racehorses with “try,” and all the horses named above have exhibited this trait. In fact, they seem to consistently overcome the “flaws” that penalize them in the sales ring! As you would probably expect, a lot of Smart Strike’s SWs are out of Northern Dancer-line stallions because Smart Strike is a Mr. Prospector stallion. But did you know that the only inbreeding in Smart Strike’s pedigree is Nasrullah, 4×5!
Smart Strike is atypical for a Mr. Prospector stallion as his progeny take a little longer to mature and they love a route of ground. In fact, the average winning distance of his SWs is 8.6f. They are equally prolific on the dirt and turf (30 of his 62 have won on the turf) and they excel on the synthetics as well.
What made Danzig-line mares a natural choice to succeed with Smart Strike is that his half-sister is the great Canadian Danzig filly Dance Smartly! Smart Strike’s Canadian champion and horse of the year Soaring Free is out of a Danzig mare, and other Smart Strike GSWs bred this way after Lookin at Lucky and Papa Clem are G1 winner Shadow Cast; G2 winner Bel Air Beauty; and G3 winner High Strike Zone.
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Monday, January 18th, 2010
By Jack Werk
The bio mechanical and conformation guys will tell you that big stallions sometimes have a hard time fitting a large portion of the broodmare population. That’s one reason why a lot of these types of stallions, even if they are successful, are erratic at stud. They’ll get a “big horse,” usually, but not consistently (pun intended!). They are like the power hitters who don’t hit for average!
Indian Charlie, who stands for $70,000 live foal at Airdrie Stud, is a big horse. He’s listed in stallion registers as standing 16.3h! But his size hasn’t stopped him from being a really consistent sire of SWs, and he’s worth his stud fee exactly because his offspring compete at the highest levels of the sport. This weekend, he proved it once again when his undefeated 3-year-old son Conveyance won the G3 San Rafael at Santa Anita in front-running fashion. I watched the race closely because I had a personal interest in him, and, honestly, he didn’t blow me away with his win when I watched it live for the first time. But after viewing the race again a few times, I realized the colt was looking around and really did win with authority and has a lot of upside in him. For now, he’s on the classic trail for new trainer Bob Baffert, who got him when Zabeel Racing bought his after he’d won his first two starts.
Airdrie Stud's Indian Charlie
Conveyance was bred by Gulf Coast Farms LLC. This makes two Triple Crown horses in the Baffert barn for breeder Gulf Coast, which also bred the certain champion 2-year-old colt Lookin at Lucky (click here to read my post on this colt). Gulf Coast is the breeding operation of Lance Robinson and Jerry Bailey, and readers of this blog probably know that Werk Thoroughbred Consultants, Inc., makes stallion recommendations for Gulf Coast. Usually, we recommend about 8 to 10 stallions for each mare, and Lance and Jerry will choose the mating based on their conformation analysis of our pedigree choices. Smart Strike, the sire of Lookin at Lucky, was our top choice, and Lance and Jerry went with him because he fit the mare physically, too.
Indian Charlie was our 6th pick for Conveyance’s dam. He was chosen by Lance and Jerry because he fit the mare the best, and Conveyance has proven that now.
Indian Charlie is a son the top California sire In Excess, who descends from the Caro line. This is not a vibrant sire line in the US, but it is one that actually fits the broodmare population pretty well these days, because the various Northern Dancer and Mr. Prospector strains are everywhere now and it’s hard not to duplicate those names when planning a mating. Indian Charlie, however, is a complete outcross within 5 generations! The only inbreeding in Conveyance’s pedigree is a 5×4 duplication to Raise a Native and a 5×5 cross to Nashua (click here to view 5-cross pedigree)!
Indian Charlie was trained by Baffert too, and he won 4 of 5 starts, including the G1 Santa Anita Derby, his only stakes win. His only loss was a 3rd in the Kentucky Derby, where he got hurt. When it came time to go to stud, Brereton Jones, one of the sharpest guys in the stallion business, made the right offer to get him, and he hasn’t looked back since then. It should come as no surprise that Jones has his prize filly Proud Spell currently in foal to Indian Charlie!
Check out these stats: Through 9 crops (including 2010), Indian Charlie is the sire of 46 SWs, which is a mind-boggling 9% stakes winners to foals for him! That’s an unheard of number these days and an incredible display of consistency! But, he hits for power, too. His offspring include such really high-class runners like G1 winner Indian Blessing and G1 winner Fleet Indian, who showcase his skills as a sire at different ends of the spectrum. Indian Blessing, who also was trained by Baffert, earned $2,995,420 and a championship as a 2-year-old; Fleet Indian, in contrast, was a champion older mare who earned $1,704,513.
Now up to bat is Conveyance, and you can bet I’ll be rooting for him to hit one out of the park!
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Jack Werk (1944-2010)
