North America’s leading sire, Tapit, hit the $100 million mark in career progeny earnings Saturday thanks to Cupid’s victory in the Grade 2 Indiana Derby.

Through Saturday, the Gainesway Farm resident’s worldwide career earnings from nine crops of racing age stood at $100,077,292. He is the sire of 587 winners from 773 starters – for healthy average earnings of $129,466 per starter – and 84 stakes winners.

Equestrian Phillip Dutton, who will seek this third gold medal in eventing as he competes for the United States in the Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games, is involved with a trio of Grade 1-performing Thoroughbreds.

Breeders love to repeat successful patterns.

This is totally understandable, both from a commercial and logical viewpoint. The long history of nicks in Thoroughbred racing has convinced breeders and buyers alike that horses bred on the same pattern as great racers of a previous generation are more likely to be good horses themselves. Genetic logic is far less certain, but in the commercial realm, it is perception that matters.

First-time starter Ruffenuff gave her sire Dialed In his first stakes winner when the 2-year-old filly won the six-furlong Princess Elizabeth Stakes at Northlands Park in Edmonton on July 16.

Owned by Landry Curtis and Red Diamond Racing and trained by Greg Tracy, Ruffenuff took the track from the start and was much the best in the short, 3-horse field, reduced by two scratches, winning easily by 6 3/4 lengths at odds of 1.40-1. Her final time was 1:13.01. The race was worth $38,546 ($50,000 Canadian).

First-crop sire Gemologist, winner of the 2012 Wood Memorial, was represented by his first winner when the filly Morganite won a five-furlong maiden race for juvenile fillies at Del Mar with a purse of $64,725, defeating nine other fillies, all but one making their first start.

Morganite, out of the Wild Rush mare Crazy Woman Creek, pressed the early pace under Victor Espinoza, took the lead in the upper stretch, and won by 1 1/2 lengths at odds of 8.70-1 as the fifth choice.

The versatile Grade 1 winner Brilliant Speed, one of the heirs apparent to leading sire Dynaformer, was found dead in his paddock Thursday at Three Chimneys Farm in Midway, Ky., after being struck by lightning.

-- Edited Press Release --

Thoroughbred owner and NBC Sports horse racing and hockey analyst Eddie Olczyk will deliver the keynote address at OwnerView’s third Thoroughbred Owner Conference at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif., on Wednesday, November 2, 2016.

The concept of a “nick” between a Thoroughbred sire and broodmare sire is as old as the Thoroughbred itself. In fact, the period from about 1750-1820, during which something approaching the modern Thoroughbred racing system evolved, was totally dominated by the various permutations of the nick between the three greatest sires of that era, Herod, Eclipse, and Herod’s son Highflyer.

Lentenor, a full brother to Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro, was represented by his first winner from his first crop on July 11. The son of Dynaformer out of La Ville Rouge, by Carson City, is the sire of 2-year-old filly Macy’s Attitude, who won a 4 1/2-furlong maiden race at Mountaineer to register her first victory in six starts.

Macy’s Attitude, out of the Gone West mare Pulsatilla, was bred in Kentucky by Calumet Farm and is owned and trained by Tommy Short, who purchased her for $1,000 at the 2015 Keeneland September yearling sale.

Freshman sire Creative Cause sired his first stakes winner when the juvenile filly Theonewewaitedfor won the $125,345 Landaluce Stakes at Santa Anita on July 9.

Ridden by Rafael Bejarano, the gray or roan Theonewewaitedfor made or pressed the pace from the start of the 5 1/2-furlong race and drew clear in the stretch to win by 2 3/4 lengths over 7-10 favorite Miss Southern Miss in the final time of 1:03.82. Demigoddess finished third. Theonewewaitedfor was the 3-1 second choice in the six-horse field.