If you owned sire, would you breed to a mare with proven racecourse form or with proven family history?

Question

If you owned sire, would you breed to a mare with proven racecourse form or with proven family history?

Answer 1

usually breeding a decent sire to a mare with good, graded stakes or black type history is desirable, for both sides, and for this reason, if you bred a nice, fairly costly stud fee sire to any owner with a mare and money, you might water down the breeding and lower the stud value by bringing in the possibility of lower performing horses into the breeding statistics...whereas with a proven winner, there is usually positive lines in past breeding...and a better chance of creating lasting successful offspring lines...

Answer 2

I would go with the mare with a proven history at the track. However, great bloodlines are a bonus and increase the offspring's value. Many of the top stallions are only bred to approved mares. In other words, the owners of the stud want to have him bred to quality mares so that his chances of producing winning progeny increase and therefore, his value as a stallion and his stud fee can go up. Trust me, the owners of a top stallion are not letting their horse breed any mare whose owners can come up with the fee!

Answer 3

proven family. cuz then i wouldnt only have one proven hroe in the pedigree and but more. I would have a sire with a proven background and winnings before i considered this question though.

Answer 4

I would go with the mare with proven form on the racetrack.  Check this out:

http://thoroughbredreview.com/MythoftheF...

From a purely practical point of view, I don't have the "deep pockets" necessary to buy into a mare with a lot of black type close up in her pedigree.  Ideally, we'd all like to buy a mare like Rags to Riches or her cousin Peeping Fawn:  classic performance on the racetrack and many, many relatives with Grade 1 or Group I stakes credentials.  But that kind of quality is going to cost millions, maybe ten million or more.  Outside of Coolmore, the Maktoums and a few other big-ticket buyers, who can afford that now?

If I were looking for a broodmare, I would look for a filly or more that had proven performance on the racetrack, good conformation, and a certain amount of "presence."  I would would also place high value on the performance of the mare's close relatives:  I would want to see a lot of winners in her family, if not necessarily stakes winners.

Answer 5

Proven family history, every time.

Answer 6

I have been a pedigree follower for years. I would definitely stick with pedigree

Answer 7

sure.

Answer 8

In an ideal world you would want both.  I don't see the point in breeding from a mare that, for example, has failed to produce a winner in 6 foals just because she has "the right pedigree", this is one of the major causes of over-production.

You need to look at several things when matching a mare to a stallion: what sort of horse are you after, a sprinter, a stayer?  Do the two pedigrees complement each other (you do not want to breed on too close a cross)?  Personally soundness is always an issue for me - in Germany a stallion cannot go to stud unless he has raced for at least two racing seasons and cannot have used any form of medication, eg Lasix.  As a result German bred horses have a reputation for being very hardy.  I hate the idea of breeding from an unsound horse, surely you are just breeding the weakness back into the breed.

Answer 9

Having the stallion it shouldn't matter who the mare is since the mare owners will get the foal.  Your stallion can breed up to 40+ times so one mating isn't that important.  If the mare owners are willing to pay your price then that should be sufficient.  Certainly the mare owners will want a stallion that improves the mares running style or family traits (i.e. sprinter history with stamina or some speed with stamina history).

Answer 10

newmarket has it pretty much pegged, but as someone who stands two horse who were placed in the Derby, I would rather breed a mare who could run to my stud, than breed to a mare who was messed up, who might have had the ability to throw a nice horse.