ENGLISH TEXTS er set foot on the continent Northern Dancer, born in 1961, it is probably because they introduced something new which happened to align with the broader trends of their time. Freddy Head once said that he was amazed by the first Northern Dancers who came to France as they were capable of not only winning the best middle distance races at three but also, the same horses, could win top two year old races over 1,400 metres. The same proved to be true of the progeny of his best stallion descendants, his son Sadler’ s Wells, born in 1981, and grandsons Danehill, 1986, and Galileo, 1998. The Danehill and Galileo sire lines are still influential in Europe and in France, as is another one started by Green Desert, born 1983, like Danehill a grandson of Northern Dancer through Danzig. Green Desert was nowhere near as good a stallion as the other three but is still a strong presence in pedigrees through his sons Cape Cross, Oasis Dream, and Invincible Spirit.
from personnal to essential Stallions who leave numerous successful stallion sons often have an obscure or rare pedigree themselves, opening themselves up to a wider range of possible mates. Northern Dancer was a son of Canadian Champion Nearctic, and then Dubawi is a son of Dubai Millenium who only had a total of fifty six foals. Some of Dubawi’ s first top sons disappointed at stud, Makfi and Poet’ s Voice among others, but over the last few seasons a string of high class stallion sons has emerged including Night of Thunder, Too Darn Hot, New Bay, Ghaiyyath and Zarak. Dubawi’ s own success as a sire of sires may make it difficult for his sons to repeat the process, they will not be able to cover the many high class mares by other sons of Dubawi. For the future, a sire who could fit this pattern is the remarkable Wootton Bassett. Like the best stallion descendants of Northern Dancer he too produces both high class two year olds and middle distance three year olds and then there are few elite mares descended from either his sire Iffraaj or his grandsire Zafonic. The name and pedigree of a horse’ s sire is only one of the varied factors which influence its success or failure as a stallion. All the most renown sires of sires have had disappointing stallion sons among their best progeny, and then the stallions who have transformed French breeding this Century were all by relatively obscure or unfashionable sires. Nobody was actively looking for a stallion son of Noverre, Pivotal or Iffraaj in 2010.2011 and 2012 and yet this did not stop Le Havre, Siyouni and Wootton Bassett making their mark. It is also worth keeping in mind then when Sadler’ s Wells retired to Coolmore in 1985 he was an outcross himself to most of the mare population in Britain and Ireland. The leading sire lines in Britain at the time were those started by Mill Reef and Sharpen Up, while in France the leading sires were Luthier and Kenmare. Forty years later there are only a handful of representatives of these once important lines left at stud, Kendargent and his son Goken are the last representatives of the Kalamoun line which was prominent in France for fifty years. A stallion’ s success is always dependent upon the number and type of mares he is able and allowed to cover. The mare population is always in evolution and as it changes so will the type of stallion, both physically and by pedigree, which is best suited to the population. Danehill died twenty two years ago but still has promising grandsons at stud in France in Hello Youmzain, a son of Kodiac, Big Rock, a son of Rock of Gibraltar and one of France’ s most popular sires in 2025, as well as Romanised, a son of Holy Roman Emperor. Other Danehill line sires in France include Thunder Moon, through Dansili and Zoffany, Puchkine, through Danehill Dancer, Choisir and Starspangledbanner and The Grey Gatsby( through Danehill Dancer and Mastercraftsman) Danehill sired plenty of middle distance Group 1 winners but those from his line still active today are the faster ones. Galileo was active more recently but had been out of reach of most French breeders for years. He has two active sons in
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