As we outlined last year, the flashy young broodmare Raggedy has a Lane’s End pedigree through-and-through for the first couple of generations: her sire, Belmont winner Union Rags, stands at the farm still, having joined his own sire there upon his retirement, while her broodmare sire, Courageous Cat, also started his stallion career there. Meanwhile, Raggedy’s dam, the unraced Secret Ballot, was bred in partnership by Lane’s End’s Bill Farish from his homebred stakes winner Private Status.
Secret Ballot is a half-sister to the Lane’s End homebred G1 Kentucky Oaks and G1 Mother Goose winner Secret Status (by A.P. Indy, and to whom traces G1W Fair Maiden, the dam of ‘24 G2W First Resort), to multiple G3W Alumni Hall (by A.P. Indy), to stakes winner Private Gift (dam of multiple G2W Private Mission, plus stakes winner and G3P Secret Someone as well as the multiple stakes-placed Profetiza, the latter pair both by A.P. Indy), and to stakes-placed State Treasure (by A.P. Indy’s son Mineshaft).
Meanwhile, Raggedy herself is a half-sister to the stakes-placed Savoy (by A.P. Indy’s son Honor Code).
Given that A.P. Indy spent his entire stallion career at Lane’s End (where Mineshaft also stands and Honor Code stood), it is not surprising that this female family has had repeated chances with this sire-line. In light of how successful those matings were, we targeted an A.P. Indy grandson for Raggedy last year, and will send her to a son of A.P. Indy’s leading sire grandson Tapit in 2025.
Tacitus comes from one of the deepest and most current families in the stud book, as he’s out of the Eclipse Champion Older Mare Close Hatches, who is also a full-sister to the stakes-winning dam of 2023 Eclipse Champion Older Mare Idiomatic. These Juddmonte homebreds all hail from the direct female family of Blue Hen Best in Show (Tacitus’s 5th dam), who is also the ancestress of 2023 Eclipse Champion 3YO colt Arcangelo, plus other Belmont Stakes winners Rags to Riches and Jazil, and the promising young stallion Greatest Honour (like Tacitus, a son of Tapit).
Tacitus’s broodmare sire is another Juddmonte homebred, namely First Defence, who is a son of G1 Honest Lady, she in turn a daughter of the Juddmonte Blue Hen Toussaud (dam also of Empire Maker, Chester House, Chiselling, etc). So this is a pedigree replete with the highest class of runners and producers, and Tacitus did his best to live up to his illustrious lineage, taking the G2 Tampa Bay Derby (in stakes record time) and G2 Wood Memorial, as well as the G2 Suburban, and placing in no fewer than 5 G1s, including a pair of classics. His first yearlings were very well-received at the sales in ‘24, with 77 of them averaging over $63k (off a $10,000 stud fee), with individuals bringing $300k, $260k, $230k, $225k, $220k, etc.
A tall, balanced, strongly-made horse, Tacitus is a horse that we have high hopes for and have used regularly since his retirement to stud. He’ll be a perfect match physically for Raggedy, who has the same size and scope to her, but is just a touch more femininely-made.
In addition to this sire-line having done well with Raggedy’s female family, Tapit and his sons have had plenty of success with daughters of Union Rags, too. TrueNicks rates this an “A++” looking at just the Tapit/Union Rags cross which has produced G3W Frost Free and BTW Here’s the Spider and two more black-type placed horses from just 18 runners. The broader cross of Tapit with Dixie Union mares has also produced the likes of Pauline’s Pearl, Kingly, Mohaymen, Enforceable, etc.
So all signs point to a perfect pairing here, and we can’t wait to see what Raggedy produces by Tacitus in 2026!