2024 Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone

Colt by Gun Runner – Heavenly Love, by Malibu Moon

Bred in Kentucky by Debby Oxley ($2.3 million Fasig-Tipton Saratoga yearling purchase by White Birch Farm and M.V. Magnier)

Sierra Leone, taking over the top spot on Daily Racing Form’s Derby Watch line this week at 12-1, is entered in Saturday’s Grade 2 Risen Star at Fair Grounds – a prep that has produced a top-three Derby finisher in each of the last three years, and which has drawn a competitive field for this renewal. A look at this key entrant’s pedigree, which is well equipped for route challenges, reveals several other members of the Derby Watch Top 20.

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This is the third crop for Horse of the Year Gun Runner, also represented in the Risen Star by Hall of Fame (20-1 on Derby Watch). The son of stamina influence Candy Ride was immediately a breakout success at stud, with champion Echo Zulu helping him break the freshman earnings record in 2021. That first crop also included Preakness Stakes winner Early Voting. Third on the general sire list in 2023, Gun Runner is the sire of seven Grade 1 winners to date.

Sierra Leone is the first winner from two starters out of Heavenly Love, dominant winner of the Grade 1 Alcibiades Stakes around two turns as a juvenile. She is out of Darling My Darling, multiple Grade 1-placed at 2 and winner of the Doubledogdare at 1 1/16 miles as an older filly. Three of Darling My Darling’s daughters have produced stakes winners – including Grade 2 winner Forever Darling, dam of unbeaten Forever Young (25-1 on Derby Watch), who is pointing to next week’s Saudi Derby.

Darling My Darling is out of Grade 1 Ballerina winner Roamin Rachel, dam of Japanese Horse of the Year Zenno Rob Roy. This is the extended family of champion Indian Blessing, Grade 1 winner Cat’s Cradle, and, recently, multiple graded stakes winner Frank’s Rockette.

Classic sire Malibu Moon is the broodmare sire of 92 stakes winners, including champion Stellar Wind, and Girvin and Midnight Bourbon, both of whom played a role on the Derby trail in recent years. Another son of Gun Runner in this crop, Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity winner Locked (20-1 on Derby Watch), is bred on the same cross as Sierra Leone.

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