I am very proud to say that Violet is related to Stymie through her Classicist line. Stymie was born in 1941 and had a final track record of 131-35-33-28. Can you believe that he raced 131 times in his career? He began as a claiming race runner and was doing poorly, until a trainer saw his potential and saw that he was frightened of people and needed consistent handling. In two years, he had been to the post 57 times! Once they sorted out his troubles and found his distance, he just burned up the tracks. He was Champion Handicap Horse of 1945 and was voted the #41 Top Race Horse of the 20th Century by Blood Horse magazine. He was inducted into the National Museum and Racing Hall of Fame in 1975, and was so famous, some say as famous with average Americans as Seabiscuit, that he had the Stymie Handicap named after him. He was beloved for his very exciting style of racing. He was a hero to racing fans because of his heart-stopping come-from-behind finishes, sometimes by as many as 20 lengths. In his career, he beat Gallorette and Assault at The Metropolitan Handicap (a race he won twice). And he beat Assault, Natchez, and Phalanx in the International Gold Cup. Remember that Assault was a Triple Crown Winner and Gallorette the highest money-earning filly of her time. So, by the time his long, long, long career was over, Stymie had gone from losing claiming races to a leading money winner in the world. He won 25 stakes races while competing against some of the best horses of all time!! His career was ended by a sesamoid bone fracture. His owner took the winnings he earned from Stymie and built Stymie Manor in Maryland. And when Stymie passed, he was buried at Hagyard Farm in Lexington, Kentucky. Dr. Charles Hagyard of the world famous Hagyard-Davidson-McGee Veterinary owns this place. Stymie has an amazing pedigree all to himself. His dad and mom are Equestrian and Stopwatch. He has Man 'O War on the dam side of both his dam and sire. He also has Commando's kids, Peter Pan and Colin (#15 of Top 100 race horses 20th century) in his recent family tree, and lots and lots of Broomstick, Ben Brush, and Hindoo. Remember that Commando won the Belmont Stakes in 1901 and then his two boys won in 1907 and 1908. And Ben Brush and Hindoo are Kentucky Derby winners, and Man 'O War himself won the Preakness and Belmont Stakes and probably would have won the Derby, if his owner, Samuel Riddle had entered him! Anyway, Stymie has Colin twice on both sides of the dam and sire of his mom. Colin is the sire of the sire of his mom. And his daughter is bred to Man 'O War to produce the dam of his mom. What I think is really lovely is that Stymie's daughter, Classic Music, was bred to Princequillo to produce Classicist. That's lovely because that means that two big-hearted lines were crossed to produce a filly. What's more, Classicist was bred to Jaipur, and so you have three big-heart lines meeting -- Nasrullah, Princequillo, and Classic Music!! You can read more about this tough, hard-running guy at the following cites:
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