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TOPOFTHEHILL



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Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2020 18:59 pm

A big strong Grey horse who is an outcross within 5 generations (his sire Polynesian is 4 x 5 Polymelus. Obviously I have no first hand experience of him but I know a few people who did and they described him as being rather upright in his pasterns which were short and with far from perfect fetlock joints. From photographs I have his shoulder seemed to be upright too and pretty much in sync with his pasterns. So at least he was matched up in front. Since he ran 22 times and was only beaten once in the Kentucky Derby, he was second, he must have been sound or managed by a genius of a trainer.
I have watched as many clips of his races as I could find and although the picture quality makes serious analysis of his action difficult he seemed to be a long striding horse with a bit of a high knee action. in his ‘derby’ he was messed with early on and dropped too far back off a slow pace. He very nearly caught the winner with a powerful run in the straight. He was unlucky and should have been a Triple Crown winner.
His stride can only be a product of his powerful hind quarters as you would expect the upright pastern/shoulder to have limited the freedom of movement in front. His hind leg was nice and straight.
His pedigree is enormously complex on one level or remarkably simple on another. His sire is Polynesian by Unbreakable by Sickle out of Selene. Sickle is of course a half brother to Hyperion. Northern Dancer and Native dancer are both from the all dominant Phalaris sire line.
So when Northern Dancer by far the most influential sire in Europe or any of his sons or grand sons covers a mare by Native Dancer or one of his sons or grand sons you get inbreeding to half brothers, because Northern Dancer is by Nearctic whos dam is by Hyperion and as Native Dancer is the sire of Natalma (Northern Dancers dam) you get a son and a daughter of Native Dancer and that would be enough for a lot of breeders. It’s the sort of pedigree that resulted in Galileo (Northern Dancer x Sadler’s Wells out of a mare by Miswaki x Mr Prospector x Native Dancer).
Of course there is much more going on in the pedigree, there has to be, Polynesian (Native Dancers grandsire) is loaded with male crosses in what looks to be a very unbalanced way but this is negated because Phalaris and Polymelian (both sons of Polymelus) are in balance. Phalaris is by Polymelus out of Bromus x Sainfoin, while Polymelian is by Polymelus out of Pasquita by Sundridge. (Full Sister and brother)
There is a danger that I am going to over complicate this but Native Dancers dam has similar pedigree patterns only in her case its all about female lines of Bend Or, but also deep in the pedigree you can find two full brothers by Bend Or out of Napoli, Laveno and Orvieto to balance things up.
There’s tons more going on further back. Multiples of Bend Or x Macaroni crosses, instances of highly regarded full relatives like Bull Dog and Sir Gallahad both by Teddy who is missing in Northern Dancer. And many many lines of Pocahontas through different relatives, and this may be the key. Lots of the same through different individuals. Diversity and, yet uniformity.
No one can argue that Northern Dancer is the dominant sire line today in Europe and Native Dancer serves up what he needs in bucket loads. With Horses like Montjeu and of course Galileo you either have to supplement the pedigree strength by adding what is missing or compliment it by adding more of the same. Easy Peasy eh.
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