American Pharoah’s owners are bucking the conventional wisdom by continuing to race him. What’s far more common is that, if a horse does well during the Triple Crown races, the owners announce his retirement to stud immediately after the Belmont, not wanting to risk injury to a horse who’s destined for big stud fees.
Well I was just joking about the old myth, but there could be something to that. I don’t think the motivation would be gone once a race starts, but maybe it creates unwanted distraction for the horse or something like that. I wonder if there’s some fear of injury to the horse from mating also, it’s not the most graceful process in my intentionally limited experience.
Money. If artificial insemination was allowed, the supply of semen that was available would vastly increase and that would drive prices down. By enforcing a rule on live breeding, you keep the supply limited and the prices high. And everyone in the horse breeding business, even those who are paying those high prices, has an incentive for keeping the prices high. A breeder who is paying a fortune in fees this year to get his mare bred is hoping to have foals who will grow up to be champions that he can collect a fortune in high stud fees from.
That was before the Breeders Cup. Alysheba won the Classic when he was four.
As for what happens to fillies, Rachel Alexandra has given birth twice; Jess’s Dream (sired by Curlin), and Rachel’s Valentina (sired by Bernardini). The latter finished second in the 2015 Breeders Cup Juvenile Fillies. Also, Zenyatta has given birth three times (Cozmic One, sired by Bernardini (finished 6th and 7th in two races); Ziconic, sired by Tapit (“may” race for the first time next month); and, an unnamed(?) horse, sired by War Front, which died a few months later), and is in foal again (again by War Front).
Side note: back in 2012, before the horses were even born, the Wynn casino was offering odds on whether or not Cozmic One or Jess’s Dream would start the 2015 Kentucky Derby. (I think the odds on each one were around 6-1 for Yes, and 1-8 for No.)
Fair point; I probably should have said “current conventional wisdom.”
All thoroughbreds are descended from one of three foundation stallions - The Godolphin Arabian, The Darley Arabian, and The Byerley Turk. The first two of these never raced competitively while TBT ran only once.
The lineage of 95% of horses racing today, including in the US, can be traced back to TDA. The famous 18th century racehorse and sire Eclipse traces back to TDA in the sire line and to TGA on the distaff side.
As a side note, Eclipse’s sire Marske was a pretty average horse and his dam Spilletta raced only once and got beaten in the process. The owner of Spilletta paid the princely sum of half a guinea for Marske’s input to the mare. Between 80% and 95% of today’s thoroughbreds also have Eclipse in their pedigree.