Tag: Tapit

Trainer Rodolphe Brisset puts We the People through his Friday morning paces at Belmont Park. He is the 2/1 morning line favorite to win Saturday's 2022 Belmont Stakes. (Image: Skip . Dickstein)

Breaking Down the 2022 Belmont Stakes: Taking Constitutional Law 101

The first thing you need to remember about the Belmont Stakes is forget the long-believed idea the “Test of the Champion” is easy for closers to pass. It isn’t. It sounds counterintuitive, doesn’t it? Send horses 1 ½ miles – the longest distance any of them will ever run and […]

Gun Runner's stud fee went from $50,000 in 2021 to $125,000 in 2022. He set the record for first-crop progeny earnings last weekend. (Image: Sarah Andrew)

Former Horse of the Year Gun Runner Sets First-Crop Sire Earnings Mark

Gun Runner continued his climb up the stallion rankings this weekend, setting the record for all-time progeny earnings for a first-crop sire. The Three Chimneys’ stallion climbed over the $3.8 million mark when Shotgun Hottie captured a $92,000 maiden special weight race at Churchill Downs on Sunday. That sent Gun […]

Gun Runner, the 2017 Horse of the Year and 2018 Pegasus World Cup winner, debuted on the Kentucky Derby Sire Future Wager pool this year. (Image: Adam Coglianese)

Betting On The Derby Gene Pool: Who Will Father the 2022 Derby Winner?

One of the more interesting prop wagers in horse racing, betting on the sire of the future Kentucky Derby champion, opens Thursday with “All Other Sires” as the early 6/1 favorite. The Kentucky Derby Sire Future Pool is offered concurrently with Pool 1 of the Kentucky Derby Future Wager, but […]

Even at 20, Tapit remains one of the top stallions in the world. His stud fee remains $185,000 for the 2022 breeding season. (Image: Gainesway Farm)

Even at 20, Gainesway’s Champion Sire Tapit Holds His Value

Three-time Champion Sire Tapit’s stud fee remains at $185,000, the primary takeaway from Gainesway Farm’s 2022 stallion roster fee update. Even as Spendthrift Farm’s Into Mischief continues to draw most of the oxygen and attention on the sire tables, Tapit remains North America’s leading sire over numerous categories. He leads […]

Flippant goes from this Listed Virginia Oaks victory to Saturday's Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland. (Image: Coady Photography)

This QE II Challenge Cup Contender is Certainly Flippant

It was in the genes that Flippant would run her first two races on dirt. After all, that’s what Tapit offspring do. They run on dirt. Often, quite well on dirt, as we’ve seen with the likes of Belmont and Travers winner Essential Quality, among numerous others. But Flippant flipped […]

Essential Quality (left) and Hot Rod Charlie separated themselves from their 3-year-old rivals at Saturday's Belmont Stakes. Both came out of the 1 1/2-mile race set for future summer contests. (Image: Al Bello/Getty)

Essential Quality, Hot Rod Charlie Ready For More After Belmont Stakes

Even after Hot Rod Charlie reeled off record early fractions, and even after Essential Quality caught and passed him in the stretch, both leading protagonists from Saturday’s Belmont Stakes came out of their 1 ½-mile “Test of the Champion” in fine form. “He looks amazing. It doesn’t look like he […]

Essential Quality gives Eclipse Award-winning trainer Brad Cox a wonderful opportunity to win his first Triple Crown race. He's the 2/1 morning-line favorite for Saturday's Belmont Stakes. (Image: Charlie Riedel/AP Photo)

Could Essential Quality Close Triple Crown Hole in Cox’s Resume?

For Brad Cox, is Essential Quality the final piece of the Triple Crown race puzzle? First, there was Owendale’s third in the 2019 Preakness Stakes. Then, there was Mandaloun finishing second in the 2021 Kentucky Derby. Can Essential Quality give Cox his first American Classic victory in Saturday’s Belmont Stakes? […]

Not even his most devoted supporters saw Into Mischief enter the 2020s as North America's top stallion. The sire of Kentucky Derby winner Authentic captured that honor for the second consecutive year in a runaway. (Image: Coyle Photography/Spendthrift Farm)

Into Mischief Takes Top Stallion Honors for Second Consecutive Year

That Into Mischief became North America’s leading stallion for the second consecutive year is borne out by facts that carry weight, heft and meaning beyond the breeding shed. Yes, there’s the $225,000 stud fee he commands. That hasn’t stopped would-be filly and mare owners from beating a path to his […]

Will this be the year super sire Tapit finally fathers a Kentucky Derby winner? You can bet on this through the Kentucky Derby Sire Future Wager. (Image: Gainesway Farm)

Derby Sire Future Wager: You Can Bet on the Derby Winner’s Dad

You can make Kentucky Derby futures bets at William Hill Nevada and – starting Thursday and running through Sunday – Churchill Downs through its first Kentucky Derby Futures Wager pool. But now, you can also wager on Kentucky Derby sires through the Kentucky Derby Sire Future Wager. That’s right. You […]

Into Mischief broke a 2016 Tapit record for highest progeny earnings in a calendar year. (Image: Spendthrift Farm)

Into Mischief Again Proves He’s a Breed Above the Rest

Into Mischief illustrated again why he is the most sought-after sire in North America when his suddenly hot 2-year-old, Life Is Good, won his Del Mar debut Sunday. With the victory, Into Mischief broke the North American single-season progeny earnings record. When Life Is Good romped home by 9-½ lengths […]

Constitution blew away the competition in the 2015 Donn Handicap. But he's blowing away the competition as a sire in 2020. (Image: WinStar Farm)

Promising Pedigree: Constitution Progeny Showing What’s in Sire’s DNA

His racing career was promising, but unfulfilled – four victories in eight starts. Even being a son of standout sire Tapit, there was nothing in the crystal ball foreshadowing what awaited Constitution in the stallion shed. Which illustrates why horse breeding is such an inexact science, and why semi-royal bloodlines […]