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Who is the Best Sire in the Country Right Now?

Let’s start this of with one simple question: Who is the best sire in the country right now?

If you answered War Front, English Channel or Kitten’s Joy then you are someone I can talk racing with. Calling a horse the greatest sire in the country is pretty serious stuff, so I wanted to really look at the data and be as objective as possible before I threw out such a bold statement. When the numbers were finally crunched, it became pretty apparent who deserves to command the highest stud fee.

Now, some of you may not be surprised by the data, which I am about to share, but most of you will. I looked at all turf stakes races in the U.S. and Canada, which were stakes races contested at 8 furlongs or longer. I then looked at the amount of total starts that sire’s progeny has made over the past five years to find the ratio of “Special Wins” to “Overall Starts”. A sire had to have at least 1500 starts over the past five years in the U.S. and Canada in order to be considered.

The big takeaway: War Front is sickeningly good at being a sire. His ratio of one “special win” per 65.3 starts was good enough to put him in first place! His horses have tactical speed, but can also carry that speed better than I thought. English Channel, Dynaformer and Kitten’s Joy were also able to break the 100-start mark. Of course, with Dynaformer having passed away we won’t have many opportunities to capitalize on his greatness.

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Now, here is where art and science merge to form true analysis. Stats aren’t everything-they can’t be. What stats are is a jumping off point. To truly understand anything about racing we must let our head start the journey and let our heart take us the rest of the way.

The 100-start threshold The reason why I wanted to get my hands on this data so badly is because no sire can truly be great unless he can get one “special win” per 100 starts. This is the price of admission so to speak. If you cannot meet the 100-start threshold, there is no way on earth you can consider yourself an elite sire. So War Front, English Channel, Dynaformer and Kittens Joy are the only sires worthy of being in the discussion. Now, we use our hearts and our racing knowledge to truly figure out who is a cut above the rest.

War Front: Some sires just give their offspring speed without taking away stamina. Bold Ruler was like that and War Front is like that as well. When he gets a broodmare who liked a distance of ground in her racing career he doesn’t interfere with that. He just ads his speed to the foal and lets the foal use the stamina his mama gave him. This is no better evidenced than with the great Declaration of War. He has the body and natural speed of a sprinter, but carries that speed incredibly well. How many horses can run a mile as well as Verrazano and come within half a length of winning the Breeder’s Cup Classic? The scary thing is War Front will most likely keep producing horses like this as long as he’s paired up with broodmares with a history of producing distance horses. My only hope is that more of his foals stay in the United States because I have a feeling the next Sunday Silence, Lure or Invasor will be from this guy.

English Channel: I like him, I really do. The problem with English Channel is that even though it is early in his career, he seems to be what I would call a go with the flow sire. Basically, there are some sires whose offspring always turn out to be more like the dam rather than the sire. English Channel seems to be this type of horse. He’ll have a successful stud career because of the fact that he’s crossed with the best lines in the country, but I have a feeling that if I crossed him with a Minnesota bred claimer that I’d wind up with something that I could personally outrun myself.  He passed the 100-start threshold, but he’s the least talented of the four horses that did.

Dynaformer:  Being that Dynaformer has passed away, I won’t wax philosophical about his greatness, I’ll just say that he was a champion and easily the second greatest stallion on this list. He will be missed.

Kitten’s Joy: Kitten’s Joy is a beast. He actually had more “special wins” than any stallion on the list and unlike English Channel, can take mediocre broodmares and make them great. I don’t think we’ve seen his best foal yet, and I wouldn’t put a Breeder’s Cup Mile or Turf victory past him. I’m also surprised about how well he nicks with so many different mares. I really think you’re splitting hairs when comparing War Front, Dynaformer and Kitten’s Joy, but like Giovanni Boldini outran Bobby’s Kitten, War Front outruns Kitten’s Joy by just a little.

In the end every single sire on this list is pretty spectacular, but in the end I had to go with War Front. He’s simply the most talented sire in America. He can get you a crack sprinter or a 12-furlong horse. He just takes the stamina the broodmare supplies and adds his lightening quick speed, and in the end those sires are the ones that have a lasting impact on the breed. I truly believe he has as good a chance of any of producing the next great American racehorse. Correction: In last week’s article I incorrectly stated that I looked back at the past ten years of information when I looked back at the past five years and ONLY counted Turf races at 8 furlongs or greater.

NEWS:  As of this posting, Thoroughbred Analytics’ picks are SIX OUT OF SIX at Arlington Park!! Way to go TA!!

www.thoroughbredanalytics.com

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