Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Hot Rod Charlie
Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Hot Rod Charlie
Nicole RussoMar 17, 2021
Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Hot Rod Charlie
Amid a logjam atop the leaderboard at the under-tack preview show for the Ocala Breeders' Sales Co. March sale of 2-year-olds in training, reigning leading sire Into Mischief and his son Practical Joke emerged as stallions to watch at the year's juvenile market opener.
Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Caddo River
Longtime horseman John Fernung died on March 5 in Ocala, Fla. He was 79. Fernung gained national prominence as the racing manager for multiple Eclipse Award-winning Lasater Stable. The operation was the leading money-winning stable in the country five years in a row and, during Fernung’s tenure, raced Grade 1 winners Honky Star, Hot N Nasty, and Royal Glint.
Juddmonte’s blue hen Kind, best known as the dam of unbeaten champion Frankel, died Monday due to foaling complications. The 20-year-old daughter of Danehill had delivered her final foal, a surviving Kingman colt, on March 2.
Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Life Is Good
Cesario, a Grade 1 winner on two continents and the dam of two champions in Japan, died Saturday at Northern Farm in Japan of a ruptured artery. The daughter of Special Week was 19.
Fresh off earning another Eclipse Award as North America's outstanding owner, the international Godolphin operation has started 2021 in strong fashion. Godolphin recorded three homebred graded stakes winners in the United States on Saturday alone, highlighted by Eclipse Award champion Essential Quality's successful 3-year-old debut in the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn. Mystic Guide gave the Godolphin blue a double at Oaklawn by winning the Grade 3 Razorback Handicap, and Antoinette captured the Grade 3 The Very One at Gulfstream.
Tapit, one of North America's perennial leading sires, turned 20 on Saturday. The Gainesway stallion celebrated by sweeping Saturday's Kentucky Derby preps, as Eclipse Award champion Essential Quality returned a winner at Oaklawn Park and Greatest Honour continued his march through the Gulfstream Park prep series.
Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Fire At Will is expected to make his 3-year-old debut on the main track in Saturday's Grade 2 Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park in a bid to step onto the Kentucky Derby trail. His pedigree strongly suggests that his future lies on the turf.