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Brazil is the country that gave us football legend Pele and is no stranger to domination in that sport. They are, however, less often at the top of the racing world, but Saturday at Medyan, Brazilian breeding prevailed in the shape of Gloria de Campeao. The much-traveled seven-year-old – runner-up last year to Well Armed – led virtually throughout and held on to score by a nose from South African Lizard Island, with Allybar (a Pedigree Consultants recommended mating) a head back in third.
 
Gloria de Campeao is by Impression (an Argentine-bred son of Champion Sprinter Rubiano, himself a Pedigree Consultants mating). Impression was a high-class sprinter in his native country and winner there of the five furlong Premio Maipu (gr. I). Gloria de Campeao is the best winner sired by Impression in his first four crops, although he’s also sired the graded stakes winner Confederade.
 
Gloria de Campeao is half-brother to Alucard, a stakes winner in Chile. There is nothing else outstanding under the first three dams, but the third dam is half-sister to Argentine Horse of The Year and Champion Three-Year-Old Uruguayo. There are a host of other top-class South American performers under the fourth dam, Unna (by Cyrus the Great, a half-brother to English Champion Two-Year-Old and 2,000 Guineas winner, Tudor Minstrel). The family reached South America in the 1940s with the importation to Argentina of Upleathum, a daughter of Derby winner, Coronach. The family goes back to the foundation mare, Stolen Kiss, also ancestress of the 1965 Kentucky Derby winner, Lucky Debonair, and Champions Late Bloomer and Dancing Brave.
 
Gloria de Campeao is out of a mare by the excellent Brazilian sire, Clackson (by I Say, runner-up in Sea-Bird II’s Epsom Derby, and in turn a son of St. Leger victor Sayajirao, and from a Boussac family). The opportunities for this cross – which at the most distant remove considered by TrueNicks would be defined as Fappiano/Sayajirao – have been distinctly limited, and Gloria de Campeao is the first stakes winner from the handful of runners it has produced.
 
Gloria de Campeao does, however, have a very clever pedigree. The granddam of Impression is a mare called Giaconda. She is a three-parts-sister to Farnesio, a grade I winner Argentina – the Gran Premio Jockey Club – and a stakes winner and graded placed in the U.S. Well, Farnesio just happens to appear in Gloria de Campeao’s pedigree as sire of his second dam, so Gloria de Campeo has the three-parts-sister and brother Giaconda and Farnesio 3 x 3. Incidentally, Good Manners, the sire of Giaconda and Farnesio, is a son of Nashua bred on very similar lines to Gold Digger, the dam of Mr. Prospector, who is in the male line of Gloria de Campeao.
 
Incidentally, Gloria de Campeao is not only the sole stakes winner bred on the cross which produced him, but he is also one of only two stakes winners from more than 70 starters for the sire, so it seems like the inbreeding to genetic relatives may well have been crucial to his ability.
 

Filed under: Recent Winners, Mares, Sires, Pedigree Elements