Keeping It in the Family: Sirelines in the 2016 English 1,000 Guineas

Zoffany's Illuminate has Danzig on both sides of her family.

While Galileo took a step back and let War Front shine as the sire of the most QIPCO 2,000 Guineas entries, the stallion made sure to keep a firm hold on the QIPCO 1,000 Guineas this weekend.

The 18-year-old Sadler’s Wells (Northern Dancer) son has three daughters competing in this Sunday’s race but that is only the tip of the iceberg for the stallion with sons Sixties Icon and Teofilo also having a runner apiece. Galileo is also represented in the broodmare sire category with his daughter Beyond Compare throwing the Jim Bolger runner Turret Rocks. In all, six of the 16 runners in this fillies’ classic can find Galileo in their pedigrees. Sadler’s Wells’ sons Montjeu and Barathea also have entries in the race with Montjeu’s Motivator siring Midweek and Barathea as both a damsire and the sire of a damsire in the race.

But Sadler’s Wells family is far from the only line dominating the pedigrees of this year’s 1,000 Guineas contenders. His recently pensioned stablemate Danehill Dancer is responsible for two of the mares who produced Galileo’s runners in this race (Alice Springs and Minding) in addition to siring the dam of one of Shamardal’s two runners (Aljazzi). Danehill Dancer isn’t the sire of any of the runners in this year’s event but his son Fast Company is the sire of Jet Setting, who is out of a Johannesburg (Hennessy) mare.

Alice Springs

Danehill Dancer’s sire Danehill is part of the sireline of four of the runners and in addition to Danehill Dancer’s three daughters is the damsire of one other runner in the race. Danehill is by the influential Danzig who is found in the first four generations of sire lines in the pedigrees of 11 of the runners in the field. Fourteen of the 1,000 Guineas contenders’ sires trace back to Danzig’s sire Northern Dancer while the two contenders who don’t have that stallion in their sire’s pedigree can find him in their damsire’s line.

Giant’s Causeway, who traces back to Northern Dancer, continues his roll in major classics this year through his son Shamardal, who has two runners in this race. Giant’s Causeway is also the sire of two runners in the Kentucky Derby and the damsire of one in the Kentucky Oaks. The stallion stands at Coolmore’s American base, Ashford, but was Europe’s 2000 Horse of the Year and makes regular appearances in pedigrees of European runners. His sire, Storm Cat is also the damsire of the Galileo filly Ballydoyle.

Giant's Causeway

Another former U.S.-based stallion making a show of things with multiple runners is the late Kingmambo. The Mr. Prospector son is the sire of King’s Best, whose daughter Fading Light produced the Teofilo (Galileo) filly Fireglow, and Kingmambo’s own daughter Dubai Queen produced the lightly raced Sharja Queen (Pivotal), who is lining up in the 1,000 Guineas off of just two starts.

Since 2000, 14 different sires, 12 grandsires and 14 damsires have had 1,000 Guineas winners. Mr. Prospector and Sadler’s Wells have both sired both the dam and sire of 1,000 Guineas winners this century but no stallion has both sired a 1,000 Guineas winner and the dam of a 1,000 Guineas winner in that time.

Danehill Dancer and Kingmambo both have a chance to be the first to end that drought as Danehill Dancer has sired two 1,000 Guineas winners in this century and Kingmambo has sired one.