All Equine All The Time

Competitive Edge A $750,000 2-year-old purchase, Competitive Edge hit the track running for trainer Todd Pletcher when he debuted at Saratoga in late July 2014. There was no question who was best that day with the bay colt winning by 10 ¼ lengths. Competitive Edge was thrown to the top level of the sport from there when Pletcher entered him in the Grade 1 Hopeful Stakes. While the colt didn’t win as easily, jockey John Velazquez still didn’t have to ask him to give everything he had with Competitive Edge winning by 5 ¾ lengths. A hairline fracture forced the colt to miss the rest of his 2-year-old season but he returned on March 27 the next year in the Tamarac Stakes. The time off only seemed to make Competitive Edge even better and he led wire-to-wire to win in what the chart caller wrote was “the handiest of winners.” Next up was an assignment at Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May but it came in the newly renamed Grade 3 Pat Day Mile instead of the Kentucky...

Declaration of War From War Front’s (Danzig) second crop, Declaration of War helped to set his sire on a fast track to European success when the Coolmore partners bought into the horse after his 2-year-old season. Declaration of War started his career in France for breeder Joseph Allen where he made two starts as a 2-year-old, winning both by a combined 11 lengths under Christophe Soumillon. It looked like he was on the fast track to classic success but Declaration of War was sidelined nearly all of his 3-year-old year with his first start of that season coming in September. When he returned back to the track, Coolmore had joined his ownership group and he was based at Ballydoyle with trainer Aidan O’Brien. His first start back was a fourth by four lengths to Famous Name (Dansili) in the Group 3 Refuse to Bend Solonaway Stakes but he got back to his winning ways three weeks later when dropped out of the group stakes level. A run six days later in the Group 3 Diamond Stakes gave him...

Munnings When Coolmore’s Demi O’Byrne paid $1.7-million for Munnings as an early 2-year-old, expectation were high for the chestnut son of Speightstown. After winning three graded stakes races and finishing on the board in six others, Munnings retired to Coolmore’s Ashford Stud for $12,500 (approx. €11,523/£8,792) in 2011. That crop produced 109 live foals with 53 of those making it to the track as 2-year-olds. Twenty-seven of those first 2-year-olds went to the winner’s circle with three stakes winners and one graded stakes winner in 2014, allowing Munnings to finish fourth by earnings behind Quality Road (Elusive Quality) on the Leading First-Crop Sires list.  Munnings also finished second behind fellow Ashford Stud Lookin at Lucky (Smart Strike) by winners and stakes winners (Super Saver (Maria’s Mon) tied with Lookin at Lucky at the top of the stakes winners list). But with 108 runners representing the stallion in 2015, the odds swung in his favor. Munnings had...

Every year hopes and expectations are high in breeding sheds around the world with the biggest weight placed on stallions whose first foals are arriving. While there are 11 months until breeders can first see how the foals are received as they go under the hammer for the first time at the fall breeding stock sales, how the first foals look in the first few months of the year can affect a sire’s book in his second breeding season. Foals by new stallions can make or break stallion owners' dreams. Over 150 stallions in North America are listed on Blood-Horse as entering stud in 2015. Here are 12 of the major stallions whose foals breeders and fans should look out for this year. Standing in New York, multiple Grade 1 winner  Alpha bred 68 mares in 2015. During his career, Alpha called New York home and loved the state’s tracks with all his wins and placings coming at Saratoga, Belmont and Aqueduct. Alpha won the Grade 1 Travers in a dead-heat with Golden Ticket (Speightstown)...

Uncle Mo in 2015 A force to be reckoned with on the track, Uncle Mo (Indian Charlie) has turned that success to dominance in the breeding shed. The 8-year-old stallion was far and away the best first-crop sire in North America by earnings in 2015 with his 28 winners tallying up $3,675,388 by the end of the year. While Tapit (Pulpit) was breaking records on the General Sires list this year, Uncle Mo broke a previous record Tapit had set when he topped Tapit’s 2008 first-crop sire earnings of $2,811,337 by $864,051. Uncle Mo and Tapit are the only two horses to break the $2-million mark as First-Crop sires since 2000 according to the Blood-Horse Stallion Register’s list. To put Uncle Mo’s progeny earnings into perspective, Twirling Candy (Candy Ride) was second in the standings by earnings and his foals only made $1,167,144, nearly $500,000 less than Uncle Mo's highest individual earner. Uncle Mo’s earnings were also enough to give him a comfortable $510,465 lead ov...