Tuxedo Annie is being bred in 2017 to Golden Years (Not For Love x Sweet Annuity, by Oh Say; $1,500 LFSN at O’Sullivan Farms)
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Unlike the rest of our mares, Tuxedo Annie is not being bred with a commercial purpose; rather, her foals will be kept to race with our partner. As such, a slightly different set of criteria will be applied when choosing her mates on a year-to-year basis, and in 2017 she will be bred to the first-year West Virginia sire Golden Years.
Golden Years was a $120,000 sales yearling by longtime Mid-Atlantic leading sire Not For Love, a price that was almost three times the average paid for yearlings by Not For Love that year. He quickly went about justifying that price by winning his 6 furlong debut at Laurel as a 2-year-old, then taking the $100,000 Maryland Million Nursery Stakes in his second start. He closed out his four-race juvenile campaign with a 7-length victory in the $100,000 Maryland Stakes over 7 furlongs versus open company, and was 3rd in the one-mile Miracle Wood Stakes in his lone sophomore start.
His sire, Not For Love, is a legend in the Mid-Atlantic region and recently received national attention as the broodmare sire of two-time Eclipse Horse of the Year California Chrome. Golden Years’ dam, Sweet Annuity, is a five-time stakes winner and a half-sister to three other multiple stakes winners, including multi-millionaire Russell Road.
Golden Years is inbred 3×4 to the full-sisters Numbered Account and The Cuddler, who are both by Buckpasser out of Intriguing, by Swaps (and who are also both inbred to the “Blue Hen” mare La Troienne via her daughters Baby League and Businesslike). This is reminiscent of California Chrome’s female family, which features inbreeding to Numbered Account herself. Golden Years’ pedigree also features a fifth line of La Troienne via her daughter Belle of Troy.
Tuxedo Annie, meanwhile, will contribute two lines of La Troienne (one via Buckpasser and one in the pedigree of The Axe, whose 2nd dam, Big Event, is a full-sister to Buckpasser’s 2nd dam, Businesslike), giving the foal from this mating a total of seven lines of La Troienne, who “is widely regarded as the most important broodmare imported to the United States during the 20th century and is the foundation mare of her own branch of Bruce Lowe Family #1.”
Even more interesting is that Tuxedo Annie is inbred 5×5 to the Wheatley Stable Champion filly High Voltage (“sex-balanced” through a son, Bold Commander, and a daughter, Irradiate), while Golden Years traces tail-female to Dynamo (his 6th dam), who is also the dam of High Voltage – meaning that the foal from this mating will be linebred to Dynamo 7x6x6.
And since Tuxedo Annie’s 6th dam in tail-female, La Chica, is also the 3rd dam of the great Native Dancer (who appears twice in the pedigree of Golden Years and three times in Tuxedo Annie’s pedigree), this foal will have a total of six lines of La Chica.
(Can you tell that we recently finished reading Ken McLean’s “Designing Speed in the Racehorse”?)
Closer up, this match will result in more conventional inbreeding of 3×4 to Mr. Prospector, 4×4 to Northern Dancer, and 5×5 to Buckpasser.
All of which, we hope, will prove to be a potent blend of great old Wheatley/Phipps families.