 |
| Hot Summer bests Maple Forest in the Victory Ride Photo: Adam Coglianese, Courtesy of NYRA |
The three-year-old Malibu Moon filly is fast cementing her credentials as a specialist at distances up to a mile, and a peak at her pedigree suggests why she was cut out to be a good one. She has now won or placed in six of her seven career starts, and earned $245,700.
Purchased for $180,000 by current owner Harold Queen at the 2009 Keeneland September sale, Hot Summer is the third foal from the stakes-placed Quiet American mare, Summer Delight, who has also produced stakes-placed Southwest (by Cozzene). The mare's yearling colt by Hard Spun will be offered for sale next month at Keeneland, and her two-year-old Lemon Drop Kid colt, Stirred Up, who brought $420,000 at last year's venue, is in training at Del Mar.
Hot Summer is the latest in a line of top-class fillies from A. P. Indy's son, Malibu Moon, who has established quite a reputation as a sire of good distaff runners, including Grade I winners Life At Ten, Devil May Care, Malibu Mint, Malibu Prayer, and Funny Moon.
Shortly after Hot Summer entered the winner's circle at Saratoga, Pedigree Consultants tweeted: "Crazy good nick for Hot Summer--son of A. P. Indy over a Quiet American mare." And indeed, the cross has produced Champion Bernardini (by A. P. Indy out of Quiet American's graded stakes-winning daughter, Cara Rafaela), Grade II winners A P Warrior and Astrology, and this year's Busanda winner, Dance Quietly.
A. P. Indy and his sons have actually done well not only with daughters of Quiet American, but also with mares by other sons of Fappiano, too. This pattern has produced Wood Memorial winners Tapit (Pulpit/Unbridled) and I Want Revenge (Stephen Got Even/Roy), Grade I winner A. P. Adventure (A. P. Indy/Fappiano), Grade II winner Apart (Flatter/Unbridled), and the current graded stakes-placed two-year-old colt, Brigand (Flatter/Quiet American).
But in my opinion, it's not just this nick that makes Hot Summer's pedigree so noteworthy. Rather, it's the fact that Hot Summer descends from the great foundation mare, Missy Baba, who is her fifth dam as well as the fourth dam of her grandsire, A. P. Indy. To make it even more intriguing, Hot Summer carries two more crosses of this superior female family by virtue of the fact that she is inbred to Broodmare of the Year Weekend Surprise, the dam of both A. P. Indy and Summer Squall (sire of her second dam). She beautifully embodies the "Rasmussen Factor," a pattern of female family inbreeding through different individuals that has consistently produced a higher-than-average percentage of graded stakes winners.
Interestingly, Hot Summer's breeders, Lazy Lane Farms, sought to replicate this pattern when they bred her dam, Summer Delight, to A. P. Indy's close relative, Lemon Drop Kid, a mating that produced the aforementioned two-year-old colt, Stirred Up. By Kingmambo, Lemon Drop Kid is out of Weekend Surprise's half-sister, Charming Lassie (by Seattle Slew).
Stirred Up is therefore inbred to Lassie Dear (dam of both Weekend Surprise and Charming Lassie), 3 x 5. And as a result, Missy Baba appears as the fifth dam of both Lemon Drop Kid and Stirred Up, who seems to have the birthright to be as good as or better than his Victory Ride-winning half-sister.