Tactical Landing semen available Down Under

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Tactical Landing (3, 1:50.4), the fastest harness racing son of former champion trotter and now premier sire Muscle Hill (1:50.2), will be available to ‘Down Under’ breeders this season via frozen semen from Stallions Australasia.

Not only was Tactical Landing a Breeders Crown champion – he won the three-year-old title last year – he was sired by a dual Breeders Crown champion, Muscle Hill, his dam, Southwind Serena 1:55.4 ($385,088) was a Breeders Crown champion at 3 and he ranks as a full brother to the Breeders Crown winner Mission Brief 1:50.4.

Tactical Landing was a top racehorse in his own right, winning $812,300 from 16 starts – an excellent total in a brief career.

As a three-year-old he won nine races and was four times placed from 14 starts for $810,800 and was one of the highest stakes-winning trotters in North America in 2018.

Undoubtedly the highlight of his stellar three-year-old campaign was his front-end win in the $500,000 Breeders Crown Final at Pocono Downs, in which he defeated Met’s Hall and Crystal Fashion by open lengths in 1:52.2 on a sloppy track.

Tactical Landing took his record of 1:50.4, winning a leg of the time-honoured Kentucky Futurity at Lexington and finished second in the $434,000 Final in a world record 1:50. He also captured a division of the $240,000 Bluegrass Stake in 1:51.2 at Lexington and an elimination of the $1.2 Hambletonian in 1:52.4 and was a strong third in the final.

Tactical Landing closed out his campaign with a hard-hitting win in the $350,000 TVG Championship at The Meadowlands, sitting parked for the last half-mile and defeating 3YO Trotter of the Year Six Pack by 2-½ lengths in 1:51.8.

An $800,000 yearling, Tactical Landing, a commanding individual, 16 hands, looks every inch the blood he represents. He is a son of the great Muscle Hill, the world’s leading living trotting sire and sire of sires, while his dam, Southwind Serena, is a daughter of arguably the greatest trotter of all-time, Italy’s Varenne.

Southwind Serena has stamped herself as one of the finest broodmares of all-time. Besides Tactical Landing, she is also the dam of a dual world champion in Mission Brief, winner of 19 races and $1.5million and voted 2YO and 3YO Trotting Filly of the Year, Exemplar (1:53.2) and Earn Your Wings (1:54.8).

The second dam, Spice On Ice (1:57.8) left five winners and is the grand-dam of the Kentucky Futurity winner Ice Attraction (1:50.2) and Canadian 2YO Filly Trotter of the Year The Ice Dutchess, while the third dam Spicy Bones produced six winners.

Tactical Landing stood his first season at the prestige Southwind Farms in New Jersey this year. His service fee will be $16,500 including GST in Australia and $15,000 plus GST in New Zealand.

 

by Peter Wharton

 

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