Memories of Dance Smartly and other Sam-Son greats color fall sales season

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Thirty years ago, Dance Smartly, one of the greatest runners produced by the legendary Sam-Son Farm, became the first Canadian-bred runner to win a Breeders’ Cup race when she wrapped up an Eclipse Award in the 1991 Distaff. Now, just days before the 2021 Breeders’ Cup, the families cultivated by Sam-Son are still prominent, with a descendant of Dance Smartly helping the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall yearling sale to a record renewal.

The sale of the $925,000 Street Sense colt bred and consigned by Sam-Son was bittersweet, as the operation founded by the late Ernie Samuel announced in October 2020 that it was winding down operations and would disperse its stock. That process has played out at public auctions throughout this season, generally providing a major boost to those selected sales as other major players seek to acquire the successful families carefully cultivated by Sam-Son through the generations.

“You hate to see a 50-year operation like Sam-Son make a business decision – the family dynamics have changed,” Fasig-Tipton president Boyd Browning Jr. said regarding the sale of the Street Sense colt. “But they’ve just had a wonderful program. They’ve brought some wonderful horses to us here.”

The Street Sense colt, who was purchased by the partnership of Repole Stables and St. Elias Stables, posted the highest price ever for a colt at the Fasig-Tipton October sale, and tied the auction’s all-time record, matching a Storm Cat filly sold in 1999.

Fasig-Tipton reported that 1,153 horses changed hands during the four-day sale, which concluded Thursday evening, for gross receipts of $52,607,500. That smashed the prior record gross of $38,258,900 for 1,008 horses sold at the 2019 edition of this sale, which took place during what was generally considered a solid marketplace prior to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

Fasig-Tipton October’s average price was $45,627, surpassing the prior record of $37,955, also established in 2019. The median was a record $22,000, surpassing the $18,500 achieved in 2014.

The sale-topping colt is out of the winning A.P. Indy mare Dance With Doves, dam of Grade 2 winner Dance Again and Grade 3-placed Swoop and Strike.

Dance With Doves is out of Canadian champion Dancethruthedawn, winner of the Queen’s Plate and Woodbine Oaks and later a Grade 1 winner in New York.

Dancethruthedawn is out of Dance Smartly, who earned both Eclipse and Sovereign Awards for her 1991 campaign, in which she swept the Canadian Triple Crown and later won the Distaff. In total, the daughter of Danzig won 12 of 17 starts, including 10 stakes, and never missed the board. A Hall of Famer on both sides of the border, Dance Smartly went on to a renowned broodmare career, producing another Queen’s Plate winner in Scatter the Gold, as well as Grade 2 winner Dance With Ravens.

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Dance Smartly, out of Sam-Son’s homebred stakes winner Classy ’n Smart, was a half-sister to three graded stakes winners. Those include Grade 1 winner and leading sire Smart Strike, through whom Sam-Son’s influence has continued to be felt on the Breeders’ Cup through the past three decades. Smart Strike, who died in 2015, is the fourth-leading sire by Breeders’ Cup earnings, behind only Galileo, Unbridled’s Song, and Storm Cat. Smart Strike has produced several sons who had success at stud, including Curlin, who is the seventh-leading sire by Breeders’ Cup earnings, and the second-leading living sire, behind Tapit.

Curlin has five pre-entrants for the 2021 Breeders’ Cup, led by Grade 1 winners Malathaat and Clairiere in the Distaff. He is one of three sons of Smart Strike with runners pre-entered for the Breeders’ Cup, along with English Channel and Lookin At Lucky. Curlin is continuing the line as a promising sire of sires, having produced Palace Malice, who has sired a Breeders’ Cup winner. Curlin’s son Connect has Grade 1 winner Rattle N Roll and Grade 3 winner Hidden Connection pre-entered in this Breeders’ Cup from his first crop.

Meanwhile, just days following the anniversary of Dance Smartly’s triumph at the Breeders’ Cup, the Sam-Son dispersal will continue. The operation has nine mares cataloged at the Keeneland November breeding stock sale, including several more members of this family. Dance With Doves, a daughter of Dancethruthedawn, will be consigned along with her daughter Swoop and Strike.