5/31/14 The One-Two Punch

Over the last few years, two stallions have been consistently at the top of the sire ratings.  Let’s look at their pedigrees to see how they stack up against each other.  While they may appear to be totally different at first glance, these two have some remarkable similarities.  Sir William Robert and Undulata’s Nutcracker have each sired 6 Champions as of 2014.  Those numbers are certain to grow for each sire.   They were each born a year away from the 2000 Y2K millennium, Sir William Robert the year before and Undulata’s Nutcracker the year after.  Both stallions have a large number of Hall of Fame Broodmares in their 5 generation pedigrees.Sir William Robert  holds a slight edge with 17 to 16 for Undulata’s Nutcracker .   Sir William Robert  had a show record, while Undulata’s Nutcracker does not, however, Undulata’s Nutcracker wins the title for most clever baby names.  Who knew there were so many ways to include Nut in a name?

Sir William Robert traces directly to Supreme Sultan on both his sire and dam’s sire lines, his sire through #1 ranked sire Sultan’s Santana and his dam through top ranked sire Champagne Fizz.  Undulata’s Nutcracker on the other hand, also traces to the same sire on both his sire & dam’s sire line, but instead of Supreme Sultan, he traces to Wing Commander.  His sire & grandsire were #1 ranked Caramac & WGC Will Shriver, and his dam traces to WGC Yorktown.  So their bloodlines have the same theme, but different players.  However, looking at similarities, both sire’s dams were by Vanity’s Sensation.  Caramac’s dam and Santana’s Charm’s dam were both by this former #1 ranked sire.  Looking at their dam’s pedigree, Oman’s Desdemona Denmark appears twice in Undulata’s Nutcracker’s pedigree, and once for Sir William Robert , but a generation closer for the same percentage of blood.

Although Undulata’s Nutcracker seems to favor the Wing Commander bloodlines, he does have two crosses to Supreme Sultan on his dam’s side.  And our Supreme Sultan-bred Sir William Robert ?  Of course, he has a shot of Wing Commander on his dam’s side.  Remember that in theory, a sire & dam each provide 50% of genetics and bloodlines for any offspring, the next generation grandparents each provide 25%, great-grandparents 12.5% and so on down the list getting more dilute the further back we go.  Utilizing statistics from one of my favorite websites, allbreedpedigree.com,  the horses appearing more than once in Sir William Robert ’s pedigree with the highest percentage of bloodlines are Supreme Sultan 18.75%, King’s Genius, Rex Peavine, Anacacho Denmark, Bourbon King, Edna May’s King and Reveries Desdemona in order from 1^st through 7^th.  The same seven appear in Undulata's Nutcracker’s list, in somewhat different order.  Undulata’s Nutcracker’s top ranked horse is Rex Peavine, who appears 40 times in 9 generations for a whopping 19.92%.  Second is Anacacho Denmark, Bourbon King is third, Reverie’s Desdemona fourth, Edna May’s King is sixth, King’s Genius seventh and Supreme Sultan is 12^th.  This is calculating the percentage of bloodlines based on nine generations of their pedigrees.    Much further down the list, Stonewall King appears for both stallions.  Undulata’s Nutcracker has two crosses and Sir William Robert  has three crosses, all through his Missouri bred BHF great grandmother, Hillcrest Enjoli. And of those top seven horses appearing multiple times in both Undulata’s Nutcracker & Sir William Robert’s pedigrees?  The only mare in the group was Reverie’s Desdemona.  She was the dam of Oman’s Desdemona Denmark who appears in both pedigrees, as well as full sister Kate Shriver from Undulata’s Nutcracker’s pedigree and full brother Golden Thunderbolt from Sir William Robert ’s pedigree.   Have I hit you with enough statistics for one day?  Fun stuff!  Both stand at Willowbank Farm in Simpsonville, KY.  Do you think they are best buddies, or rivals for the top spot?  One last comparison:  Both stallions had grandsires that were World's Grand Champions.  Sultan's Santana was a WGC Fine Harness horse,  CH Will Shriver was a WGC five-gaited horse.  As of 2013, Undulata's Nutcracker has sired 51 World's Champions, however, Sir William Robert is the only one of the two that has sired a World's Grand Champion, Sir Silver Knight, the 2013 WGC three-Gaited horse.
*note: Stallion ads in the 2014 Journal of the American Saddlebred states that Undulata's Nutcracker is the sire of 65 World's Champions and WC Sir William Robert is the sire of 29 World's Champions.*

As to which is the best?  Who wins the One-Two Punch?  They are both brilliant sires, with trainable, athletic, beautiful babies.  They will both dominate the sire ratings for years to come, much as their respective great-great grand sires, Wing Commander & Supreme Sultan did in their day.  In the name of diversity, there are many other great stallions that are available out there, but no one can take away from the success of these two sires.

UNDULATA'S NUTCRACKER        Stallion   3/31/2001     

[PHOTO]

U	CH Caramac 4/8/1978		CH Will Shriver	Callaway’s Johnny Gillen	CH Wing Commander
					Fourth Estate BHF
				CH Kate Shriver BHF	Anacacho Denmark
					Reverie’s Desdemona BHF
			Stonehedge Vanity	Vanity’s Sensation of Crebilly	Sensation Rex
					CH Meadow Vanity
				Lofty Elaine	Yekcohs
					Ruth Elaine
	Christmas in New York ERB 6/11/1991		The New York Times	New Yorker	CH Yorktown
					Sandalwood Stonewall
				Canterbury Lane	Oman’s Desdemona Denmark
					Croft’s Star
			Nativity	Native Promise	Oman’s Desdemona Denmark
					Starla
				Nancy O’Lee	Supreme Sultan
					Molly O’Lee

SIR WILLIAM ROBERT   Stallion   5/4/1999   

[PHOTO]

Sir William Robert	Santana’s Charm 4/26/1981	Sultan’s Santana	Supreme Sultan	CH Valley View Supreme
				Melody O’Lee BHF
			Grand View’s Majorette BHF	Golden Thunderbolt
				CH America Beautiful BHF
		Vanity’s Belle	Vanity’s Sensation of Crebilly	Sensation Rex
				CH Meadow Vanity BHF
			KY. Cardinal Belle BHF	CH King’s Genius
				Beverly Belle
	Rebel Empress 6/6/1991	CH Heir to Champagne	Champagne Fizz	Supreme Sultan
				Commander’s Elegance
			Hillcrest Enjoli BHF	Hillcrest Bourbon Stonewall
				Hillcrest Secret Heiress
		CH Cherry Rebel	Oman’s Desdemona Denmark	Anacacho Denmark
				Reverie’s Desdemona BHF
			CH Golden Cherry	Shoreacres Anacacho Genius
				Black Cherry BHF

Now for some pictures.

Sir William Robert

Sir William Robert

Undulata's Nutcracker

Undulata's Nutcracker

Undulata's Nutcracker

Undulata's Nutcracker

We can also ask some of their babies if they'll tell us which sire is best.   Nuttin' Doin' said one. Nut a Chance said another.   You only gave Sircumstantial Evidence.  What do you think of your sire? He's Jamaican Me Crazy came the reply.  And yet another stated that he was Extremely Fortunut.  I guess it's all a matter of opinion.

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Next week it is back to the past, June of 1954.