Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

re: Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

sceptre — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 23:13:27 GMT

Thanks, Alan. I had noticed the same thing re-the Mr. P. connection with Candy Ride and mares by sons of Storm Cat. This Candy Ride/Storm Cat presumed affinity, that of the above, Candy Ride's affinity for Seattle Slew, etc. all lead me to suspect that what Candy Ride really wants-above all else- is a "well-bred" mate. I say this after reviewing all his runners, noting the above affinities, and concluding that Candy Ride, himself, is not (at least, superficially) a well-bred horse. Also, while Candy Ride did receive, in numbers, relatively large books in his initial seasons, their quality was somewhat suspect. This, too, factored into my take that Candy Ride wants, most of all, a well bred mate. If I'm correct, the future should surely bode well for Candy Ride, now that he's established himself as a near-elite stallion-he will now receive a higher proportion of well-bred mares-and I suspect his Nicking patterns will change.

re: Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

Joltman — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 01:43:01 GMT

hey guys - I'm wondering if you can run some customized reports for broodmare sire nicks. What I'm thinking about something that would simply list the greatest nicks (by score' perhaps grouped by stud fee of the broodmare sire. Such a list could be helpful identifying mares that may be lesser known (or sires active say in the SH), affordable, but also with great potential upside if bred to the right stallion. Such mares would be interesting to see how the profile of all the sire lines performed - as to whether it was a very narrow success range for one or two sire lines, or perhaps the opposite.

re: Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

Alan Porter — Mon, 17 Feb 2014 20:07:45 GMT

Sceptre/Joltzman

A couple of interesting comments.

With regard to the Candy Ride/Storm Cat cross: when we created the TrueNicks algorithms, we made a decision to base the rating on the closest representation we could come to the actual cross, so we would minimize "interference" from positive or negative affinities that might exist via more distant representatives.

So for Candy Ride with a Storm Cat mare, only starters on that direct cross are considered. For Candy Ride with a mare by, say Giant's Causeway, Tale of the Cat or Stormy Atlantic, the rating is based on Candy Ride with mares by Storm Cat and his sons and grandsons. If we look at the TrueNicks enhanced report for Candy Ride with a mare by a son of Storm Cat, we see that he has graded winners out of mares by Storm Creek and Sea of Secrets (both out of Mr. Prospector mares) and two out of mares by Forest Wildcat (whose dam is by Bold Native, a close relative to Mr. Prospector), so we might use our old fried "intelligent interpretation" to infer that Storm Cat in combination with Raise a Native could be a positive for Candy Ride.

As Joltzman says with the "supernicks" you can get crosses with a high-frequency stakes production at a modest level, or swing and miss crosses with low success rates, but high-quality for the ones that are good, and virtually any combination in between.

We do see similar patterns with stallions in isolation too For example, Cox's Ridge sired 6% stakes winners to foals (not spectacular for a high-class sire in that era), but better than 25% of his stakes winners were grade one winners (he actually had 12 grade one winners, but only 9 at grade two or three level combined).

A more consistent sire, like Dixieland Band, had 8.3% stakes winners to foal, but only 8% of them were at grade one level (he had 9 grade one winners, but 36 grade two and grade three winners, a totally different "shape" to his record). So Cox's Ridge was your home run slugger, swinging and often missing, where Dixieland Band picked up more singles and doubles.

A study similar to the one you suggested would probably pick up some interesting trends, both regard to individual sires and broodmare sires, and with crosses.

re: Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

Joltman — Sun, 16 Feb 2014 20:12:05 GMT

Seems like, the Super Nicks are like home run hitters in baseball, who sometimes strike out a lot and their average is so-so, but are sometimes awesome. Others, though maybe don't hit quite as many, but have strong averages, hit a lot of extra base hits etc.

It would be interesting to scatter chart profiles of stallions/nicks in terms of racing class/earnings where these profiles might translate into recognizable patterns.

re: Super Nicks, Super Ratings?

sceptre — Sun, 16 Feb 2014 01:26:16 GMT

Hi Alan,

If one runs a TrueNicks enhanced report for Candy Ride with any given Storm Cat mare it does yield an A++, but this rating is based only on Candy Ride with mares sired by Storm Cat- the data containing mares by Storm Cat sons (grandsons, etc.) with Candy Ride is not factored in this rating. In the case of Candy Ride it appears that this additional data would factor positively for this cross, while in other instances it could factor negatively. I didn't run it, but if one ran a report for Candy Ride with a mare sired by a son of Storm Cat would this additional data be included in the report, and factored into the rating?