Home

Surprisingly, the richest race of the past weekend wasn’t one of the graded contests. Instead that honor went to the inaugural Charles Town Classic, a nine-furlong contest with a purse of $500,000. The winner, who more than doubled his lifetime earnings, was the Two Smart (by Two Punch) gelding Reseacher. This was the sixth win in his last seven starts for Researcher, who last year gained graded status with a win in the Queens County Handicap (gr. III) at Aqueduct.

Researcher is the only stakes winner for his sire, a Maryland-bred who captured the Sir Barton and two additional stakes at Pimlico. He is also the only stakes winner produced by any of his first four dams (although his granddam was stakes-placed, and his fourth dam is a half-sister to champion 2-year-old Hoist the Flag).

With this in mind, it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that Researcher has quite a clever pedigree. Rated A by TrueNicks, he has the brothers Mr. Prospector and Red Ryder 3 x 3 at the top and bottom of the pedigree. (Duplicating Raise a Native and Gold Digger through Mr. Prospector and one of his brothers, Red Ryder or Search For Gold, has worked quite well and there are at least 13 other stakes winners with this combination.)

In the pedigree of Reseacher, the Mr. Prospector/Red Ryder combination is supplemented by a double of Nantallah, which comes through two of his most important daughters, Lady Dulcinea (stakes winner, and multiple stakes producer, including champion 2-year-old filly Heavenly Cause), and Moccasin (Horse of the Year at 2 on some polls, and a noted producer, including Researcher’s broodmare sire Apalachee, an English champion 2-year-old). It’s worth noting that Nantallah is bred on very similar lines to Nashua, the broodmare sire of Mr. Prospector/Red Ryder: he’s by Nasrullah out of a mare by Flares (grandsire and granddam, Sir Gallahad III and Flambette (FR)), where Nashua is by Nasrullah out of a mare by Johnstown (dam, La France, by Sir Gallahad III out of Flambette).

Filed under: Recent Winners, Pedigree Elements

comments powered by Disqus