Three of the Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks prep races on Saturday, February 1, featured remarkably similar results. The Forward Gal S.-G3 at Gulfstream was won by unbeaten Tonalist’s Shape, by Tonalist. The Withers S.-G3, at Aqueduct, was won by Max Player, by Honor Code. And the Holy Bull S.-G3, again at Gulfstream, was won by Tiz the Law, by Constitution. See the trend? Tonalist, standing at Lane’s End, is by Tapit, making him a great-grandson of A.P. Indy. Honor Code, also at Lane’s End, is by A.P. Indy himself. Constitution, the second leading first crop sire of 2019 by earnings, stands at Winstar Farm, and is, like Tonalist, by Tapit. The grand old man, A.P. Indy, continues to dominate the 2020 three-year-old picture, even as such great contemporary sires as Into Mischief, whose son Mischevious Alex, and Pioneer of the Nile, whose son Thousand Words, took the other two derby preps, continue to produce exciting colts.

Tonalist could hardly have been expected to throw precocity with his first crop of 2019, as his one start at two yielded little, while his three-year-old campaign yielded a Belmont S.-G1 win and a Jockey Club Gold Cup S.-G1 win, with a repeat performance of that victory at four. Throw in his Pleasant Colony dam, and his Pleasant Colony looks (the very high withers, masculine head, and stout bone), marking him as different looking from other sons of Tapit, and the grass ability that should come with the Pleasant Colony influence, and you’d hardly expect him to pass dirt speed to his offspring. Yet Tonalist’s Shape has made her mark on the Oaks trail. The key is her terrifically outcrossed pedigree. There is no inbreeding through the fifth cross, and yet…lurking just beyond that is the powerful combination of Northern Dancer sons who are closely related, Nijinsky II and Storm Bird, plus a dose of Topsider. There is a wealth of Princequillo through male and female offspring. There is a doubling of Secretariat through his dam, Somethingroyal, top and bottom. Tapit loves both Deputy Minister and his sire, Vice Regent, as is evidenced by his many stakes performers featuring these, and lurking in the fifth position is Vice Regent himself, on Tonalist’s Shape’s dams’ side.

The real deciding factor in Tonalist’s Shape’s dirt ability, however, must be the presence of Meadowlake, through his son, Meadow Dancer, the filly’s second broodmare sire. Meadowlake, as a sire, embodied brilliance, toughness, precocity, and dirt ability, and during his tenure at Darby Dan epitomized North American dirt breeding, while being a wonderful outcross for most mares. The other strong dirt influence in the dams’ side of this filly is none other than Triple Crown Winner Affirmed, calling out to the Mr. Prospector and Fappiano in Tapit, and to the Raise a Native in Meadowlake.

Honor Code’s pedigree all but guarantees his success at stud. Out of the Storm Cat mare Serena’s Cat, his third dam is Champion and multi-millionaire Serena’s Song, by Rahy, creating therefore, in Serena’s Cat, a pedigree very similar to that of Giant’s Causeway (Storm Cat on a Rahy mare). Honor Code features Secretariat top and bottom, through his daughter Weekend Surprise on top, and his daughter Terlingua, on bottom, arguably the best and most influential daughters of Secretariat who ever existed, as they gave us the breed-altering A.P. Indy and Storm Cat. Examining Max Player’s pedigree, patterns begin to materialize. As in Tonalist’s Shape, multiple doses of Northern Dancer appear, through Storm Cat, Northfields, Dance Number, Deputy Minister and daughter Cold Reply in this case, and Mr. Prospector is likewise doubled (4 x 3), top and bottom, as is Buckpasser (5 x 5). Halo appears twice (7 x 5), top and bottom, adding his own dam, Cosmah, a daughter of Almahmoud and half-sister of Natalma, Northern Dancer’s dam. There exists, because of this, an obvious wealth of Mahmoud in Max Player. Plus the shadow of Meadowlake, through his second dam’s sire, French Deputy, whose own dam, Mitterand, was by the same sire as Meadowlake, Hold Your Peace, almost lost in contemporary pedigrees.

Constitution was the surprise star of the freshman sires of 2019. The worst psychic in the world could have predicted that American Pharoah would be number one, but who would have thought that Constitution would be so close behind in the second position? His gorgeous son with the huge, dramatic blaze on his face, Tiz the Law, seems the most likely of this Indy-trio to get the distance of the Triple Crown races, as he is triple-bred Seattle Slew (5 x 6 x 5), quintuple-bred Northern Dancer through Nijinsky II, Danzig, Storm Bird, Lyphard and, as in Max Player, a female carrier of his genes, his granddaughter Lonely Dancer. It is, however, his second dam’s sire, Belmont S.-G1 winner Go for Gin, who cements his claim on stamina, as Go for Gin’s sire, Cormorant, is, like Pleasant Colony, by His Majesty, and out of a Stage Door Johnny mare: Tiz the Law should be able to run forever. Mitigating this stamina, however, is brilliance: the full siblings Moon Glitter and Relaunch appear top and bottom, 5 x 4, and add their own doses of In Reality and The Axe II (Mahmoud) to the extant In Reality in Unbridled on top, and Crafty Prospector on bottom, who are closely related, not to mention the other dose of the Axe II in Constitution, through his son Al Hattab. As well, La Troienne, the Blue Hen of Blue Hens, makes numerous appearances through doubled Buckpasser and tripled The Axe II.

After reviewing these three scions of the A.P. Indy line, it should come as no surprise that a perusal of the leading second crop sires list features Constitution at number one, Tonalist at number two, and Honor Code at number four, as close to a monopoly as you can get. Though he was foaled in 1989, A.P. Indy remains the most important influence in 21^st century pedigrees, and his sons, grandsons and great grandsons seem poised to insure the continuation of this trend.

-- Roberta Smoodin