News

Double Danehill - The First

8th Feb 2010

Breednet - Tara Madgwick - Tuesday, 9 February 2010

When talented filly Psychologist powered away to score a scintillating win in the Group Three MRC Blue Diamond Prelude on Saturday she wrote her name into the history books as the very first stakes-winner to carry a double cross of champion sire Danehill, a development that will have pedigree buffs the world over considering the implications.

Click here to view Psychologist's pedigree.

Yearling buyers have become accustomed to seeing youngsters carrying the double cross of Danzig and the cross has achieved a degree of success through horses such as Zipping, Rostova, La Montagna, Marching, Able One and the like, but the double cross of Danehill ( pictured) takes it a step further.

Pedigree expert Byron Rogers of internationally respected Pedigree Consultants LLC offers his thoughts on inbreeding to Danehill, a horse that is in fact inbred himself.

Inbreeding to an inbred horse, which Danehill is (3x3 to the mare Natalma), has some precedent in the breed with the top class racehorse and sire In Reality (he being 3x3 to War Relic, himself inbred 3x3 to the mare Fairy Gold).

It is worth noting that in the case of In Reality, and a number of other horses, when it comes to inbreeding to a horse that is inbred, it does tend to occur when the horse falls in the third generation and beyond, as we have seen again here with Psychologist.

There are certainly some cases of this occurring closer in pedigrees, but these were in horses at the turn of the last century and certainly in the modern (post 1960) thoroughbred, there are few cases where a stakes winner has emerged being inbred closer than 3x3 to a horse that was inbred itself.

It is also worth noting that duplicating Danzig has been moderately successful to date, but invariably it is falling to the strains of Danehill, Anabaa, Green Desert or Grand Lodge being combined within this quartet or another son of Danzig, e.g Danehill/Grand Lodge (Marching) or Green Desert/Danehill (Able One) or say Testa Rossa/Anabaa (Rostova).

Notably from a pedigree perspective these four are all sons of Danzig who while racing themselves as typical of their sireline, i.e sprinters, they bred horses that were able to get distances well beyond their own capabilities as runners.

There is no doubt that there is going to be a lot more duplication of Danzig in pedigrees, indeed more duplication of Danehill and as we have seen with Psychologist, this is not necessarily a bad thing.

Unlike Danzig , Danehill was as sound as they come and his horses have a lot of qualities that trainers like in horses (they sleep, eat and run fast!) which makes him a fantastic stallion to inbreed to.

There are not a lot of holes in Danehill if you are looking to him as a subject to inbreed to in the hope of increasing your chances.

Just as we have worked out the sons of Northern Dancer that combine well in pedigrees, and are starting to appreciate the sons of Danzig that are now combining in pedigrees of major stakes winners throughout the world, we are going to start to see the better sons of Danehill combine in various ways.

Jane Henning of Pedigree Dynamics is another well respected pedigree expert prepared to offer her thoughts on the Psychologist milestone.

There will be more horses inbred to Danehill cropping up at sales in future and personally, I am not a fan, and if the base statistics of the relative success (% wise) on inbreeding to Danzig is projected onto inbreeding to Danehill, the only really significant impact on the breeding industry will be an even tighter gene pool.

8284 Danehill line mares were covered in 2009 and no doubt many of them were covered by Danehill line stallions.

On Day One of the Gold Coast Magic Millions sale, 20 of the 200 lots were inbred to Danzig , three of those inbred to his son Danehill.

A flick through the First Session of the upcoming Inglis Easter catalogue reveals that 14 of the 200 lots are inbred to Danzig , one of those being inbred to Danehill.

Removing my own opinion on the overall projected success of inbreeding to Danehill, I imagine that, like inbreeding to Northern Dancer, there will be certain sons that respond well to inbreeding and other that have poor records.

For instance, Nijinsky II had a far better strike rate when mated to other Northern Dancer line stallions than many of his peers, but was atypical of the Northern Dancer line in type.

In the case of Psychologist, her dam sire Danzero is atypical of Danehill sons in type and may be one that does work well with other Danehill line sires.

The all powerful Northern Dancer line has been able to flourish by breeding back to itself in combining branches of the dynasty that have developed distinctive qualities.

Look at pictures of Sadler’s Wells, Danzig, Nijinsky and Storm Cat and you will see some very different horses whose progeny have achieved widely differing things on the track.

It is perhaps going to be the ‘atypical’ sons of Danehill (ie. As an example Danzero, Commands, Danewin, Nothin’ Leica Dane) that will hold the key to any sustained success of the double Danehill cross in the future.

Byron Rogers expands on the idea of atypical sires and how they might be used to effect.

If we take a line through the sons of Northern Dancer, and now the sons of Danzig that are combining well in pedigrees, you rightly point out that there are differences and while this often manifests itself physically (Nijinsky was a 16.3 hand horse who combines well with Storm Bird, a 15.2 hand horse as an example of this) there is also an aptitude criteria to consider.

If we look at Psychologist, and she is the only example we have to date, her grand-sire Danehill Dancer (VRC Oaks winner Arapaho Miss aside) has probably been limited as a stallion to get horses that can run past a mile (brilliant as they are nonetheless).

Danzero on the other hand has bred horses more regularly capable of getting a mile and further.

Down the road you can certainly imagine combination of sons of Redoute’s Choice with mares by Exceed and Excel or Lion Hunter as an example in the pedigree of a major stakes winner, but I think it would be less likely that you would see the latter two (sprinters that throw sprinters) combining themselves.