Market Share wins The Hambletonian & everything old is new again.

[Triple V]

A French sireline (Revenue S) and a maternal line tracing to Evensong combine to win The Hambletonian and another branch of that damline that moved over to the Pace a fair while back produced current 3yo filly Major Look, the winner of The Mistletoe Shalee earlier last month plus a recent stakes record smashing win in The Adioo Volo at The Meadows only 5 or 6 days ago.

[Pete]

A French sireline (Revenue S) and a maternal line tracing to Evensong combine to win The Hambletonian and another branch of that damline that moved over to the Pace a fair while back produced current 3yo filly Major Look, the winner of The Mistletoe Shalee earlier last month plus a recent stakes record smashing win in The Adioo Volo at The Meadows only 5 or 6 days ago.

Hi Triple V - I have a broodmare by Forrest Skipper from this maternal line (a pacer). Have had the mare for ages (she won a couple in country Vic) and I bred from her before I knew as much as I know now - looking back I probably shouldn't have bothered. (She actually comes from a long maternal line of unperformed stallions with very little talent in it but much further back as you say there is plenty of talent in that maternal line especially the trotting lines).
Her foals grow into great looking horses though but none of them so far have shown much. She has a big black three year old by Metropolitan who shows something but we cant seem to get him right. Just got a filly weanling by Safari from her. Hopefully a better quality of stallions will help her produce something that shows ability. She had a lovely big Peace of Art filly who injured herself before she started racing and I just got her in foal to Gotta Go Cullect. Thinking that the Direct Scooter influence might help the family. She is linebred to Tar Heel so there is some broodmare sire talent in there amongst it. It's interesting to look back at the previous breeding decisions in the family and wonder why.

[Triple V]

G'day Pete,

I read a piece in a magazine somewhere only just recently where the person involved, a breeder, said that they try to avoid broodmares by disappointing sires.
On the surface that sort of an approach makes all the sense in the world...but in practice I'm not so sure that it holds any water at all.
As far as Broodmares go I've never really given a bugger about who their damsires are because by and large I don't think they (the damsires) play all that much of a role insofar as directly influencing a mare's chances of becoming a successful producer or not.
For mine it has been and will always be the case that the maternal family is stronger than the individual & further to that I think the maternal line is invariably going to be stronger than a single sire or damsire or two or maybe even three of them.

A great & current case on point is the incredibly talented WA 3yo filly, Sensational Gabby. She's by the moderately performed racehorse Yankee Sensation & from a mare by a sire that any sane person wouldn't touch with someone else's 40ft pole....Mystical Shark.
However, I think it is her 2nd dam that is by Holmes Hanover and her immediate maternal family has produced outstanding racehorses such as Kliklite, Top Tempo, Musical Delight & The Court Owl. Another few steps back and another branch of it has left Destreos, Franco Hat Trick, Franco Heir, Threepence, Our Sixpence & so on.

Kind of on this subject, there was a 4 or 5yo race mare I thought we should have grabbed when she came up for sale in QLD a few months back and I'm still kicking myself about it. She was by the Abercrombie horse, As Promised, not exactly a name on everyone's lips, I know, but a handy enough sire and she was a good race winner with a good time & she came from what was IMO a successful winner producing immediate maternal family, one that was arguably better overall than she actually was herself. She was also a good sized, long bodied sort of a mare & she had won as a 2yo, 3yo & 4yo+. They didn't want a whole lot for her either as I recall. I'll be very surprised if she doesn't make someone a succesful producer in years to come.

Another thing which has always puzzled me is how basically the complete reverse of the above so often applies to stallions...as in how many of the great sires of the Standardbred Breed came from mares by offbeat/obscure/disappointing sires....and on top of that again how many also came from short on performance immediate maternal families.