Two Flemington stakes-winners on Saturday trace back to the same broodmare along their tail female line and this winner of the 1984 Listed WATC Gimcrack Stakes has spawned an impressive Black Type dynasty that has also given us a couple of promising young sires whose first foals are being born this spring on opposite sides of the country.
By the champion West Australian sire Jungle Boy (GB), Getting There was a fast and precocious filly that had just six starts for two wins and two placings with both of her wins coming as a spring two year-old. Her career highlight was a victory in the Gimcrack Stakes at Ascot, which in recent times has been switched to the autumn and was won last year by Amelia’s Jewel, who has since emerged as a superstar and won the Group II VRC Let’s Elope Stakes at Flemington on Saturday.
While Getting There never scaled the heights expected of Amelia’s Jewel this spring, she has more than made her mark at and two of her descendants Star Patrol and Griff claimed stakes races at Flemington.
A gifted sprinter by Starspangledbanner, Star Patrol posted his first Group win when nosing out King of Sparta to win the Group II VRC Bobbie Lewis Stakes (1200m), while three year-old colt Griff won the Listed VRC Exford Plate (1400m) to become the first stakes-winner for his sire Trapeze Artist.
Getting There is the fourth dam of Star Patrol and sixth of Griff, the former coming from the Tristachine branch of the family and the latter from the Western Music branch.
Tristachine and Western Music were both stakes-winners for Getting There, who produced 11 winners from 12 foals to race, but it is her Sydney metro winning daughter Procure, who has really set the family alight through her brilliant Group II winning daughter Hips Don’t Lie.
A runaway success as a producer both in commercial and racetrack terms, Hips Don’t Lie has left three juvenile stakes-winners in Ennis Hill (dam of last season’s brilliant Group II winning filly Learning to Fly), Lake Geneva and Acrobat, while her Group II placed half-sister Acquired is the dam of Group II winning sprinter Splintex and stakes-winner Invictus Salute.
Both Acrobat and Splintex are now at stud, with Acrobat covering 188 mares at Coolmore last spring at a fee of $13,750 and Splintex covering 118 mares at Darling View Thoroughbreds in WA at a fee of $11,000.
Both stallions are by champion sires Fastnet Rock and Snitzel respectively and have been given great opportunity in their jurisdictions to succeed and if we know anything about them and their famous family it’s that speed and precocity are inherent in their makeup.
