Kentucky Derby pedigree profile: Further Ado

Further Ado

Colt by Gun Runner – Sky Dreamer, by Sky Mesa

Bred in Kentucky by John Oxley ($275,000 Keeneland September yearling purchase by George Mellon; $550,000 Ocala Breeders’ Sales Co. spring 2-year-old purchase by Spendthrift Farm)

Gun Runner won the 2017 Breeders’ Cup Classic to emphatically lock up Horse of the Year honors. The six-time Grade 1 winner was inducted into the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. As a stallion, he has also been spectacular. Gun Runner set a freshman earnings record in 2021, and quickly became competitive among the nation’s leading general sires, with top-three finishes in 2023, 2024, and 2025.

Gun Runner is the sire of three horses in this week’s Derby Watch Top 20 – Paladin, Further Ado, and Brant. While current Kentucky Derby favorite Paladin awaits the Grade 1 Blue Grass, a busy weekend is on tap for his other runners. Further Ado begins his 3-year-old campaign in the Grade 3 Tampa Bay Derby on Saturday. On the opposite coast, Brant launches his season in the Grade 2 San Felipe.

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Although Gun Runner is the sire of a number of Grade 1-winning sprinters, overall, his progeny have inherited his stamina and his pattern of improving with experience. His son Sierra Leone, second in the 2024 Kentucky Derby and third in the Belmont Stakes, won the Breeders’ Cup Classic later that season to lock up an Eclipse Award title. He was also a Grade 1 winner last year at 4.

Gun Runner is also the sire of Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winners and divisional champions Echo Zulu and Super Corredora, and 2022 Preakness Stakes winner Early Voting.

Echo Zulu was a multiple Grade 1 winner around one turn. Society and Taiba were Grade 1 winners around both one and two turns. Brant will hope to also have that sort of ability. Winner of the Grade 1 Del Mar Futurity, he was third in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile in his first try around two turns.

Further Ado’s dam, Sky Dreamer, was second in the Grade 3 Arlington Oaks at nine furlongs on synthetic, and is the dam of five winners from six starters, including Kimbear, a multiple group winner in Dubai. But interestingly, Further Ado, who took the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club last fall, is the only one of her runners to win beyond a mile.

Sky Dreamer is a half-sister to Dream Dancing, winner of the Grade 1 Del Mar Oaks around two turns on turf. Their second dam is champion Beautiful Pleasure, whose six Grade 1 wins included the 1999 Breeders’ Cup Distaff. Beautiful Pleasure is a half-sister to Mecke, a Grade 1-winning router on both dirt and turf.

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