Grade 1 winner Plenty of Grace dies at 29

Grade 1 winner Plenty of Grace has died at age 29, and will be buried at Darby Dan Farm in Lexington, Ky., where she was bred.

Racing from ages 2 to 6, Plenty of Grace won the Grade 1 Yellow Ribbon Invitational at Santa Anita during her sophomore campaign in 1990, and also won the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland, then a Grade 2 event. After a multiple-graded-stakes-placed 4-year-old season, she returned the next year to win the Grade 2 Diana Handicap and the New York Handicap. She was the first of Darby Dan's four homebred winners of the Diana, now a Grade 1 event.

As a broodmare for Darby Dan, Plenty of Grace, by Roberto, produced five winners from nine starters, with several of her daughters going on to be stakes producers. Her daughter Bonnie Byerly is the dam of Grade 2 winner and sire Diabolical and Group 3 winner What a Name; Joyous Chaos produced Group 3 winner Iczotitla. Her daughters and granddaughters are also responsible for Grade 1-placed Grace Anatomy, Grade 3-placed Chagall, and stakes-placed Shell House and Position A

Out of Grade 3 winner Wings of Grace, Plenty of Grace was a half-sister to champion turf mare Soaring Softly. Their third dam is Darby Dan foundation mare Soaring. It is the family of champions Wavering Girl, Glorious Song, Singspiel, Devil's Bag, Grass Wonder, Grade 1 winner Wonder Again, sires Rahy and Saint Ballado, and, more recently, multiple graded stakes winner Recepta.