Star Studded Duds

[Chrome Prince]

The great mare Makybe Diva has only had two winning offspring:

Rockstardom
Bendigo Maiden
Cranbourne Restricted 62

Divanation
Werribee Maiden

The great mare Black Caviar has only had two winning offspring:

Oscietra
Geelong Maiden
Ballarat Benchmark 64

Prince Of Caviar
Bendigo Maiden

That's a lot of money down the gurgler.

It takes nothing away from their performances and achievements while racing, but breeding is a whole different ball game.

[thorns]

I've always wondered and you may be able to answer CP.
These 'dud' fillie and colts from superstars, do they hold any breeding value going forward because of the bloodline?

[Chrome Prince]

Thorns, there is some thinking that if they don't pass on certain genes to their progeny, then one is just wasting time and money breeding from that progeny.
I'm of the opinion that sometimes it skips a generation, as in other species, and you can get the progeny's offspring for a song financially, so it's well worth the risk rather than paying millions for the first crop.
There are exceptions to the rules as always.

When breeding, one wants a large heart and lungs, a big stride and high withers, then you want speed and endurance. It's all a very complicated lottery, because a lot of buyers buy on general conformation as well.

There have been plenty of really good horses bought for a song relatively.

But I always remember, buying yearlings's with excellent pedigree sent Bart Cummings and Mike Willesee broke. Luckily Bart learnt his lesson and had strong clientele to fund his enormous future success.