Pedigree Insights: Best Solution & Worth Waiting

[Wandering Eyes]

For any owner of a middle-distance mare, there is considerable temptation–especially in today’s speed-obsessed industry–to try to inject some pace by sending her to a sprinter. The widespread hope is that this type of mating will produce a happy blend of the sire’s speed and the mare’s stamina, with the resultant foal shining at around a mile. The possibility exists, though, that the foal will take after just one of its parents.

Events over the weekend confirmed that, if Sadler’s Wells is somewhere in the mix, the chances are that stamina will win out over speed, even when the stallion concerned has a reputation for passing on a generous measure of his sprinting ability. Firstly we saw Bated Breath’s daughter Worth Waiting produce a career-best effort to take the G3 Prix Minerve over 1 9/16 miles, little more than three weeks after she had won the Listed Aphrodite S. on her first attempt at a mile and a half. Bated Breath, a grandson of Danehill, never tackled more than six furlongs in an 18-race career and was fast enough to win the G2 Temple S. over five furlongs and to finish a close second in the G1 King’s Stand S.

Bated Breath’s older progeny have an average winning distance of 7.1 furlongs, with most of them doing their winning at up to a mile, and Worth Waiting is his first winner beyond a mile and a quarter. A look at the bottom half of the filly’s pedigree makes it easy to understand why.

Her dam, the Sadler’s Wells mare Salutare, gained two of her three wins in France over 1 7/8 miles and was tried at group level over two miles. Salutare’s dam Contare visited Sadler’s Wells’s son Montjeu to produce Montare, a filly who was even more effective over 1 7/8 miles than Salutare, as she showed in winning the G1 Prix Royal-Oak. Montare, of course, went on to produce the high-class mile-and-a-half filly Journey to the miler Dubawi and the group-placed French stayer Travelling Man to the super-speedy Oasis Dream.

I should add that Salutare represents the same Sadler’s Wells/Shirley Heights nick which produced those outstanding mile-and-a-half performers In The Wings and Alexandrova. It is also worth mentioning that Sadler’s Wells was so dominant, from a stamina viewpoint, that his progeny had an average winning distance as high as 11.4 furlongs. Only one of his many offspring–the filly Liscanna–was speedy enough to become a group winner over a distance as short as six furlongs after the age of two.

Bated Breath isn’t without some stamina in his pedigree. Although his sire Dansili didn’t stay as well as his four Group 1-winning siblings, such as Champs Elysees and Cacique, his average winning distance stands at 9.5f.

About 90 minutes after Worth Waiting’s impressive win, the G1 Grosser Preis von Berlin over a mile and a half fell to Best Solution, even though he is by Kodiac. Thanks to the likes of Tiggy Wiggy, Besharah, Ardad, Prince of Lir, Kodi Bear, Nebo and Bear Creek, Kodiac’s reputation is largely based on his ability to sire considerable numbers of fast and precocious 2-year-olds.

Best Solution appeared to conform to this pattern when he won over six furlongs at Goodwood in the July of his 2-year-old season but his trainer Saeed bin Suroor quickly recognised that Best Solution is no normal Kodiac. By October, the colt had become a Group 3 winner over a mile, in the Autumn S., and by the end of October, Best Solution had performed with considerable credit in the G1 Criterium de Saint-Cloud over a mile and a quarter. In finishing second, beaten a length, he divided Waldgeist, who was to fail by only a short head to win the Prix du Jockey-Club, and Capri, who was to win the Irish Derby and the St Leger.

Although Classic glory eluded Best Solution–he finished eighth of 18 in the Derby–he has added another three group successes, all over a mile and a half. In landing the G3 St Simon S. last year, he was followed home in third place by Danehill Kodiac, the only other middle-distance group winner by Kodiac, whose progeny have an average winning distance of only 7.2 furlongs.

Bearing in mind that Kodiac is out of Rafha, a winner of the G1 Prix de Diane, it is a little surprising that so few of his progeny stay middle distances but we have to factor in the type of mare that Ireland’s commercial breeders sent him during the years when his fee stood at €10,000 or less.

I am guessing that the type of mare sent to the son of Danehill may have changed a little over the last four years, during which his fee has climbed from €25,000 to €45,000 and then to €50,000 for the last two years. Best Solution provides plenty of reassurance for any breeders which have tried sailing against the tide.

His dam Al Andalyya earned a mere £245 in five visits to the racecourse. She was tried at up to a mile and a quarter, which is understandable for a representative of the celebrated Kingmambo/Sadler’s Wells nick. You can gauge how successful this nick was from the fact that there are 106 foals bred this way. Ten of them became black-type winners, with no fewer than seven becoming Group 1 winners. The best stayers among them were El Condor Pasa, winner of the Japan Cup and Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud, as well as finishing an excellent second in the Arc; Campanologist, a four-time Group 1 winner over a mile and a half; and Divine Proportions, an admirably versatile filly who numbered the Prix de Diane among her five Group 1 successes. It mustn’t be forgotten that Kingmambo’s other Group 1 winners included two winners of the St Leger.

Best Solution also has links to Britain’s longest Classic, as his second dam, the group-placed Kushnarenkovo, is a sister to Brian Boru, winner of the 2003 St Leger. Brian Boru and Kushnarenkovo were among the numerous Sadler’s Wells foals bred by Juddmonte Farms as part of a foal-sharing arrangement which included their dam Eva Luna for several years. Coolmore took four of the six siblings out of Eva Luna but Juddmonte retained Soviet Moon, an unraced filly who was to produce the Derby and Arc-winning Workforce to Kingmambo’s son King’s Best.

Stamina has always been one of this family’s prime assets. Eva Luna won the G3 Park Hill S. over the St Leger course and distance and her foals also included Sea Moon, who was third in the St Leger after winning the G2 Great Voltigeur S.

Eva Luna’s dam Media Luna, failed by only a neck to win the 1984 Oaks at odds of 66-1, and Media Luna’s half-sister Suni was third in the Oaks. One of Eva Luna’s half-sister, Medicosma, ranks as the second dam of Qualify, the 2015 Oaks winner sired by the champion sprinter Fastnet Rock from a granddaughter of Sadler’s Wells, Fastnet Rock, of course, shares the same sire–Danehill–as Kodiac, so Best Solution isn’t the first 12-furlong Group 1 winner bred to this pattern.

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