Harness: When it comes to breeding, what's old can be new again

Those that have been around Harness Racing for as many decades as this old scribe were hardly surprised when a horse with pacing blood won the Hambletonian and then Earl Beal Jr Memorial, following in the footsteps of his dad in coming away victorious in the latter.

Captain Corey, like Googoo Gaagaa before him, captured the Beal in 1:51, just a fifth slower than his dad nine years earlier. As mentioned, Googoo Gaagaa has some pacing blood on his sire's side, but he was clearly a proficient trotter and almost exclusively sires trotters, many who are much more than just proficient, as evidenced by Captain Corey and many top Standardbreds in Europe.

Googoo Gaagaa is by the pacing sire Cam's Rocket, a son of Cam's Card Shark, from the trotting-bred Koras Trotter by Veeba Rova, himself a trotting son of Speedy Somolli. While Googoo Gaagaa, and by genealogy Captain Corey, are the most recent exemplary specimens of gait crossover, the history of the Standardbred breed is loaded with this type of mix.

There was talk on social media about Zoot Suit, a son of Nevele Pride and the double-gaited Glad Rags, not being used much in this country, and following but a handful of pedestrian trotting foals he wound up in Europe. The dam Glad Rags (Greentree Adios-Jewel Rosecroft) did trot in her aged form. That probably enticed Norman Woolworth, master of Stoner Creek, to breed her to trotter Nevele Pride after three undistinguished foals by Meadow Skipper. Ironically, Glad Rags raced against and I believe beat Meadow Skipper in her younger days. But like many amazon race mares she was not an exceptional broodmare.

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As it was, Zoot Suit was a good but hardly exceptional horse, which probably impacted the anemic demand for his stud services on this side of the Atlantic pond.

Mr. Woolworth also bred La Pomme Souffle (Nevele Pride-Pompanette) to Meadow Skipper, resulting in French Chef, a top colt but marginal sire whose son Beach Towel was his main contribution. La Pomme Souffle took a pacing record at 2 and was exclusively bred to pacing sires, producing only pacers.

From time to time we hear about mixing the gaits, and even Bill Perretti wanted to breed a trotting mare to Matt's Scooter seeing as how his youngsters were "all trot" in the yearling paddocks at video time. Fortunately that never happened.

While some tout the "improvements of the breed" at both gaits, most tend to ignore the fact that what we've really done is purify those gaits. Most modern-day pacers or trotters are approximately five generations clear of what might be termed a mixed-bred influence. Back in the 1960's, most pacers had trotting influence within their second generation and many top stallions were proficient at throwing champions or near champions at both gaits.

Meadow Skipper's dam Countess Vivian is by King's Counsel, a pacing son of Volomite who threw many top pacers in addition to his famed trotting offspring.

Bret Hanover's second dam was by Nibble Hanover, the only horse credited with a Hambletonian winner in Miss Tilly and a Little Brown Jug winner in Knight Dream.

Worthy Boy sired the great Star's Pride, who still holds the record for siring the most Hambletonian-winning offspring. Worthy Boy got many a top pacer, including champion Stand By, Harold J, Gold Worthy, High Level, and others.

While Star's Pride sired eight Hambletonian winners, he was no slouch in the pacing department, accounting for such talented "side-wheelers" as Horton Hanover, Hunters Star, Egyptian Pride, etc. Egyptian Pride, from the Hoot Mon mare Doe Hanover, is a full brother to Hambletonian winner Egyptian Candor.

Star's Pride's stud companion Hoot Mon (Scotland-Missy) sired four Hambletonian champions. He also sired pacer Capetown, best known for his pacing son Overcall. Hoot Mon also sired a rogue pacer named Mighty Tide (Mighty Sister), a contemporary of Henry T Adios well known for trying to kick driver Bob Frame out of the sulky prior to the start. As it went, if Mighty Tide got past the starting gate still on gait, he could beat Free For All pacers, and often did.

Darn Flashy, a son of Darnley, virtually made his living by being a double-gaited stallion. In addition to the well known FFA trotter Darn Dandy, Darn Flashy provided equally well-known pacers Mr. C Song, Public Affair, and Pinehaven Flash. The latter two were very familiar to Roosevelt and Yonkers regulars back then.

That brings us to the great Sir Dalrae, the famed "Porterhouse" pacer from Queens Crown by Queens Adios (Adios-Odella Hanover). Queens Crown was double-gaited, which is probably why she was bred to the Rodney stallion Porterhouse, though later in life she did produce another excellent pacer Mr Dalrae to Meadow Skipper. Sir Dalrae actually took his 3-year-old record of 2:11 on the trot before being switched over to the pace where his career then took off.

The point here is that while ostensibly Googoo Gaagaa may be somewhat of a present-day oddity, in reality he's just a throwback to what used to be, when stallions were often double-gaited. As indicated above, many pacing superstars had trotting blood in the second or third generations. As it is, Googoo Gaagaa's Hambletonian son Captain Corey, from Luv U All by Angus Hall, is purely trotting-bred on his dam's side. Thus Captain Corey is virtually a 75% blood dosage second generation trotter, with his sire being 50% trotting bred and his dam 100% trotting bred.

Unquestionably Hambletonian champion Captain Corey will get his stallion opportunities and most likely will sire primarily trotters. I won't be shocked if he gets a pacer or two, but I'd expect him to be a "trotting" sire.

The point of all this is that we were here before when double-gaited stallions and/or broodmares were common instead of being rarities. That said, one wonders why after purifying both the trotting and pacing gaits, we'd go back to where we were since the purification has resulted in primarily natural trotters and pacers who come to their gaits almost instantly and inherently.