CONGRATS TO A.P. INDY

Click above to watch Turbulent Descent winning the Hollywood Starlet (G1)…
(Photo : ESPN - Footage : Hollywood Park)

NORTH AMERICAN FRESHMAN SIRE CHAMPIONSHIP

Turbulent Descent’s win in the Hollywood Starlet (G1) at Hollywood Park a couple of Saturdays back means Congrats has now gone beyond recall in the race for the 2010 North American Freshman Sire title; in fact, his progeny earnings are now over $1.6 million, taking him past even Leading European Freshman Sire, Iffraaj, who has been leading the combined list the last couple of months. As we noted a couple of weeks ago, it’s still all A.P. Indy, as far as the top three on the North American Sires list is concerned. Congrats, whose Wickedly Perfect had previously won Keeneland’s Alcibiades Stakes (G1), is by A.P. Indy himself, and is a full-brother to Claiborne’s successful sire, Flatter. He has no fewer than 10 individual runners that have won or placed in black-type races. You can never quite be sure what’s going to happen with Florida stallions when they migrate to the Bluegrass, but Congrats’s only graded-stakes win came around two turns as a five-year-old; you’d hardly figure him as one who would sire flash-in-the-pan, precocious types.

Extract from Thoroughbred Daily News

Editor :

At a purely parochial level, we’ve already pointed to the parallels between Congrats and our man, A.P. Arrow. Both are from Mr Prospector mares (like A.P. Indy’s top sons, Pulpit and Malibu Moon, as well as Bernardini and Tapit, bred on the same pattern), both are Grade Two winners, and both millionaires, with great pedigrees. On a strict evaluation of their racing class though, A.P. Arrow was clearly superior.