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The most exciting mating plans are those where a mare’s female family has had success with a certain sire-line, and that sire-line also happens to nick strongly with the mare in question — which does not happen as often as you might think. But in the case of the stakes-placed mare Campaign Vows, that is exactly what will be achieved when she is bred in 2019 to Quality Road’s exciting son Blofeld in a Housatonic Recommended Mating.
Campaign Vows has four half-siblings so far to race, of which three have won, and by far the most accomplished is her half-sister Who’s In Town (by Speightstown). Who’s In Town was a debut winner at 2 and stakes winner at 3, and she was also disqualified from victory in the Grade 2 Adirondack Stakes at Saratoga during her juvenile campaign. Speightstown, of course, is a son of Gone West, just like the recently-deceased Elusive Quality, whose son Quality Road is just about the hottest stallion in America right now.
Campaign Vows is a daughter of the Unbridled son Broken Vow, a very solid sire in his own right, and now a rising star in the broodmare sire ranks with his daughters already responsible for the likes of Eclipse Champion Runhappy, Grade/Group 1 winners Big World and Hampton Court, plus an additional twenty stakes winners. Of those twenty, two of them — namely Grade 3 winner Lonely Road as well as Stillwater Cove — are juveniles of 2018 and sired by Quality Road, from just two foals that he has sired out of Broken Vow mares!
This success is demonstrative of the broader cross of sons of Elusive Quality over mares by sons of Unbridled, which has so far produced five stakes winners from just 51 foals (a stellar 9.8% stakes winners/foals).
Going even further back, Campaign Vows’ broodmare sire is Cozzene, whose daughters have produced Grade 1 winner Zaftig, Grade 2 winner Paved, and Grade 3 winner Despite the Odds by Gone West and his sons or grandsons.
In addition to the positive pedigree pattern achieved by sending Campaign Vows to Quality Road’s son Blofeld, this mating makes sense in terms of both racing proclivities and physical matchups, as well.
Campaign Vows herself won twice on turf around one mile at 3, in addition to her stakes-placing on dirt at 7 furlongs, and Blofeld scored his three brilliant Graded stakes victories from 6 furlongs to one mile at 2 and 4. Although Blofeld raced just one time on turf, he was bred to be just as good on the green stuff given that Quality Road can get a top runner on either surface and his broodmare sire, Storm Cat, was highly sought-after on both sides of the Atlantic. Thus, this pairing has every right to result in a precocious and versatile foal.
Finally, as a mare who is strong-bodied but slightly short-legged, Campaign Vows’ conformation will also be complemented by the leggy and well-balanced Blofeld.
Blofeld wins the G2 Futurity
Blofeld wins the G2 Nashua
Blofeld wins the G2 Gulfstream Park Handicap