Caulfield on Untapable

Friday, Churchill Downs 
LONGINES KENTUCKY OAKS-GI, $1,000,000, CDX, 5-2, 3yo, f, 1 1/8m, 1:48 3/5, ft. 
1–sUNTAPABLE, 121, f, 3, by Tapit 
     1st Dam: Fun House (GSW, $432,922), by Prized 
     2nd Dam: Bistra, by Classic Go Go 
     3rd Dam: Carols Christmas, by Whitesburg 
O/B-Winchell Thoroughbreds LLC (KY); T-Steven M 
Asmussen; J-Rosie Napravnik. $576,600. Lifetime 
Record: 7-5-0-1, $1,124,725. *1/2 to Paddy O’Prado 
(El Prado {Ire}), GISW, $1,721,297. 
Werk Nick Rating: B+. 
Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree. 
Click for the brisnet.com chart, the brisnet.com PPs or the free brisnet.com catalogue-style pedigree. VIDEO. 

Punters who were considering a bet in this year’s GI Kentucky Oaks or the G1 1000 Guineas no doubt spent most of their time evaluating the runners’ past performances. They might have been better advised, though, to study the form of the contestants’ sires. 
Prior to the Oaks, Untapable had won two Grade IIs but not a Grade I. However, her sire Tapit had previously been represented by 12 Grade I winners, of which no fewer than eight were fillies. Of course, Untapable promptly outclassed her rivals at Churchill Downs to increase the figure to nine fillies among 13 Grade I winners, leaving no doubt that Tapit is a first-rate sire of the so-called fairer sex (if such a description is allowed nowadays). 
It was pretty much the same story over at Newmarket. Prior to the 1000 Guineas, Dansili had built an impressive total of 16 Group 1 winners. Significantly, no fewer than 10 of those 16 were fillies, including quite a few, such as The Fugue, Dank, Proviso, Price Tag and the ill-fated Laughing, which are familiar to American racegoers. It therefore came as no great surprise that his 17th Group 1 winner should also be a filly, this being the gallant Miss France. 
I am going to concentrate here on Untapable, rather than Miss France. It is well-documented that Tapit did his racing in Ron Winchell’s colors and Winchell Thoroughbreds is enjoying considerable success with its old friend’s progeny. Untapable follows Tapizar, Tapiture and War Echo as the fourth graded winner owned and bred by Winchell, who also ranks as the owner or breeder of several other good Tapits. 
These four all have something in common, apart from their owner/breeder. Untapable comes from the same female line as Tapizar and War Echo and this female line also produced Olympio, a Verne H. Winchell homebred who ranks as the broodmare sire of Tapiture. Olympio also sired the dam of Remit and Retap, a pair of useful Tapits bred and owned by Winchell Thoroughbreds. 
The Winchell’s connection to this family dates back more than 30 years, to the purchase of Untapable’s third dam, Carols Christmas. This mare had been sold twice as a yearling, with her price going from $3,200 in January to $4,000 in September. She therefore didn’t appear to be anything out of the ordinary, even though she was fast enough to win four of her 12 starts. Her sire Whitesburg had won five times from nine appearances, but his fee had been only $1,000 in the year of her birth (1977). He had clearly been fast and precocious, numbering the Bashford Manor S. among his three wins from four juvenile starts. 
However, Carols Christmas proved to be anything but ordinary during her time as a broodmare for the Winchell family. Mated to Naskra in 1987 she produced Olympio, who made a bid for the title of champion 3-year-old colt in 1991. That was the year he racked up seven wins and three seconds from 11 starts, including four Derbys, of the Hollywood, Arkansas, American and Minnesota varieties. 
Carols Christmas produced another graded winner in the Wild Again filly Call Now, who landed the GII Del Mar Debutante, and she also had a graded-placed daughter in the Pass the Tab filly Carol’s Wonder. 
Verne Winchell retained Call Now and Carol’s Wonder, together with Bistra, a winning daughter of Classic Go Go, and Carols Christmas’ talented Star de Naskra filly Christmas Star (a three-parts-sister to Olympio). His faith in the family has been thoroughly vindicated, with Bistra, Carol’s Wonder and Christmas Star collectively producing one Grade I winner (the Futurity S. winner Cuvee) and four Grade II winners, including Untapable’s dam Fun House. Another daughter, the Flying Paster filly Dana Nicole, was sold but she too produced a Grade II winner. 
Although Call Now wasn’t one of these daughters with a graded stakes winner to her credit, she made full amends via her daughter Winning Call, who produced the GI Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner Tapizar to Tapit. Call Now’s close relative Wild Vision (by Wild Again out of a half-sister to Call Now) visited Tapit’s sire Pulpit and she too hit the Grade I target, with her son Pyro taking the Forego S. Wild Vision also produced the Grade III winner War Echo to Tapit, so Untapable is a product of a tried and trusted formula. 
Her dam, Fun House, did most of her racing on turf, her best win coming in the GII Buena Vista H. over a mile. She no doubt inherited her penchant for turf from her sire Prized, a sizeable Kris S. stallion who gained his finest victory in the 1989 GI Breeders’ Cup Turf. 
There is every reason to be excited about Fun House’s future. Untapable has the potential to develop into a champion and Fun House also has a 2-year-old sister to Untapable called Time To Tap, plus a 2013 brother and a 2014 sister. Of course Fun House is no one-hit wonder, as her 2007 El Prado colt was Paddy O’Prado, a high-class turf performer who also handled dirt well enough to finish third in Super Saver’s GI Kentucky Derby. Untapable is also likely to stay a mile and a quarter, if required.