Natural Knight -some observations

After receiving mails of Seenu and Rajendra I was reluctant to write about Native Knight because it takes me 3 to 6 hrs to study ,analyse and then write about a thoroughbred. But after closely looking at his 2 races I was compelled to write about him. I’ve ignored him for the Derby because he neither had sufficient experience nor any exceptional track work .
But when I checked a bit closely I was surprised to note that he was 1 ½ lengths behind Cabriolet in race no 143 and again in Pune Derby he was only 1 ½ lengths behind hard-ridden Cabriolet! Race no 143 was his first run and Derby was the second run of racing career! Fantastic improvement ! This realization made me look a bit carefully into his pedigree .

Native Knight( Placerville- Native Tactics) apparently has no great bloodlines and is one of 70 odd produce of Placeville of 2006 .Though his dam has won 6 races but they were all sprint races and do not strengthen his chances for classic distances. Then how could he finish 1 ½ lengths behind two hard ridden class I/II runners ?

Native Tactics(Blue Bird-Miss Oriental) is a ‘got abroad’ who came in foal and did her racing in India-trained by DR Byramjee and owned by D Khaitan .Blue Bird – born in USA was a champion sprinter who raced in Ireland and placed in several graded races.

Miss Oriental(Habitat-Miss Bangkok) with Roman dosage(29-7-9-1-0) did not race and after producing 2 nondescript progeny in USA, was imported and Native Tactics is her first foal born in India. She was subsequently covered always by Young Senor and produced Coral Gables and OnnuOnnuOnnu –both champion sprinters.

Thus apparently , the immediate female line gives the impression that Native Knight may do well in sprint races . But that is not true.

A breeding axiom – reinforced and confirmed by genetic studies states that many times the attributes of grand children or great grandchildren resemble more than the next generation ( son/ daughter) .

Storm Bird(Roman Dosage, 11-7-16-0-0) -sire of Blue Bird was also sire of Storm Cat (covering fee $ 500,000), was a champion sprinter and Habitat(dosage 13-14-13-4-2) – sire of Miss Oriental was a champion miler but Ivory Dawn- the dam of Blue Bird who never raced had a dosage(4-21-17-2-0) .

Ivory Dawn( Sir Ivor-Dusky Evening) has a very impressive parentage . Sir Ivor(Sir Gaylord-Attica) was the winner of many classics including Epsom Derby and his ‘turn of foot’ was amazing. In Epsom Derby ,ridden by Lester Piggot ,he ran off the pace holding his horse till 200m and found himself 4 lengths behind connaught –ridden by young Sandy Barclay .He loosened the reigns , gave a tap to Sir Ivor and he won easing up by one length.
His trainer – Vincent O’Brien had placed a bet of 500 pounds each way for Epsom Derby win , with a bookie BEFORE Sir Ivor started his racing career!
He is also very well ‘sex balanced’ with Sir Gaylord who is sire of both –Sir Ivor from the sire side and Habitat from the dam side ( I hope puritans will forgive me for making these silly statements – because I’m writing for a common punter) . Sir Gaylord a English horse went to USA and after beating them on their home ground in some races he became the favorite for Kentucky Derby but due to a hairline fracture few days before the race his Triple Crown dream was shattered . He was retired to stud .

The question now is ? Did Native Knight receive some of the traits from these versatile and superior thoroughbreds?

The answer is : he did. His two runs in the company of the best western India runners confirm this .

But will he rise to the challenge? Depends on the training methods and the intentions …

Only time will tell…