Queen's Plate pedigree profile: Duke of Love
Duke of Love
Cupid – Tell the Duchess, by Smart Strike
Bred in Ontario by Caldara Farm, Patrick Costello, David Whitford, and Tom Zwiesler ($15,000 Keeneland November weanling purchase by War Horse Place; $40,000 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky October yearling purchase by Julie Davies, agent; $85,000 Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-old purchase by MyRacehorse)
Cupid sired last year’s Sovereign Award Canadian champion 2-year-old male in God of Love. But as this year’s Queen’s Plate approaches, it is another member of Cupid’s crop who has stepped forward in Duke of Love, second in the Grade 3 Marine Stakes and, most recently, fourth in the Plate Trial.
This is the first crop for millionaire Cupid, who scored the biggest of his four career graded stakes wins in the Grade 1 Gold Cup at Santa Anita. The son of classic sire Tapit is the sire of a pair of graded stakes winners to date, including God of Love, who won the Grade 3 Grey Stakes and Cup and Saucer Stakes at Woodbine in his championship season. Cupid also is the sire of Grade 2 Santa Anita Oaks winner Desert Dawn, who finished a creditable third in the Kentucky Oaks, was third in the Grade 2 Summertime Oaks, and second against older fillies and mares in the Grade 1 Clement L. Hirsch.
Unraced Tell the Duchess is the dam of two winners from as many starters. Duke of Love is the only black-type horse under his first two dams, but farther back, this is a highly productive international bloodline. Most notably in recent years, this is the extended family of Thunder Snow, who won two editions of the Dubai World Cup, among seven group stakes victories.
This also is a successful family in the European classics, as it is responsible for European champion filly Balanchine, winner of the 1994 Epsom Oaks and Irish Derby, 2007 French Oaks winner West Wind, and 2019 Irish Derby winner Sovereign. This also is the extended family of graded/group stakes winners Coroebus, Eastern World, First Victory, Havana Cooler, Humble Eight, Ihtimal, Phola, Red Slippers, Romanov, Shonan Mighty, and Trust in a Gust.