Ocho Ocho Ocho

Saturday, Delta Downs

DELTA DOWNS JACKPOT S.-GIII, $1,000,000, DED, 11-22, 2yo, 1 1/16m, 1:45 2/5, ft.

1–@OCHO OCHO OCHO, 119, c, 2, by Street Sense
1st Dam: Winner, by Horse Chestnut (SAf)
2nd Dam: Pennant Champion, by Mr. Prospector
3rd Dam: Personal Ensign, by Private Account

($50,000 yrl ’13 KEESEP; $200,000 2yo >14 OBSAPR). O-DP Racing LLC; B-Siena Farms LLC (KY); T-James M Cassidy; J-Mike E Smith. $600,000. Lifetime Record: 3-3-0-0, $693,600. *1/2 to Private Ensign (A.P. Indy), GSP, $124,384. Werk Nick Rating: A. Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.

Click for the brisnet.com chart or the brisnet.com PPs. VIDEO.

Virtually every edition of the Breeders’ Cup lingers long in the memory, but anyone who attended the 1988 meeting at Churchill Downs can count themselves especially fortunate. Among the male contestants were numerous luminaries whose names are still very familiar more than 25 years later, such as Alysheba, Seeking the Gold, Forty Niner, Easy Goer and Gulch. However, they were arguably outshone by the displays of some of the fillies, specifically the final appearances by two 4-year-olds whose brilliant careers were to earn them admission to the Hall of Fame.

In landing her second GI Breeders’ Cup Mile–and her 10th Group/Grade I–Miesque improved her career figures to 16-12-3-1. Less than an hour earlier Personal Ensign had brought down the final curtain on her career with a dramatic last-stride victory over GI Kentucky Derby heroine Winning Colors in the Distaff. That was her 13th win from 13 starts, even though her career had very nearly been ended by a fracture to a hind pastern after her win in the GI Frizette S. at two. The fracture required the insertion of five screws in the pastern and three months in her box. “We never thought she’d race again,” trainer Shug McGaughey admitted, but she was back in action 11 months after the Frizette and proceeded to win all four of her sophomore starts.

Racemares of this exceptional quality sometimes prove less effective in the role of broodmare, but this accusation could never be made against either Miesque or Personal Ensign. Miesque numbered the Classic winners Kingmambo and East of the Moon among her four group winners and two of this year=s groupwinning 2-year-olds–the Irish-trained I Am Beautiful and John F. Kennedy–descend from her.

Personal Ensign also has a notable 2014 2-year-old descending from her in the unbeaten Ocho Ocho Ocho, who collected $600,000 for his triumph in the GIII Delta Downs Jackpot S. This son of Street Sense is the 11th graded-stakes winner descending from Personal Ensign and the third of 2014, another being Mr Speaker, who became a Grade I winner when he held off Adelaide in the GI Belmont Derby Invitational.

Personal Ensign went one better than Miesque in that she produced three individual Grade I winners, in the process adding another accolade to her astonishing tally. Not only did she earn the Eclipse Award for older female and admission to the Hall of Fame, but she was also awarded the title of Kentucky Broodmare of the Year in 1996. She also had the rare distinction of being the first Breeders’ Cup winner to produce a Breeders’ Cup winner, when her Easy Goer filly My Flag took the 1995 Juvenile Fillies (as a prelude to three further Grade I successes, including one in the CCA Oaks).

My Flag was the second of Personal Ensign’s Grade I winners. The daughter of Private Account had started her broodmare career with three rewarding visits to Mr. Prospector. The first produced Miner’s Mark, whose finest moment came when he won the 10-furlong GI Jockey Club Gold Cup. Next came the speedy, but unfortunate Our Emblem. He had to be counted somewhat unlucky not to add to his dam’s Grade I score, as he was beaten just a nose in the GI Carter H. and two noses when third in the GI Vosburgh S. Of course, he made amends by siring War Emblem, hero of the 2002 Kentucky Derby and Preakness S.

Personal Ensign’s third consecutive Mr. Prospector foal was Ocho Ocho Ocho’s second dam, the dual winner Pennant Champion, and a later visit to the great Claiborne stallion yielded Traditionally, winner of the GI Oaklawn H. over a mile and an eighth.

Altogether, Personal Ensign produced 10 named foals. Nine raced and all nine won. She had five daughters by five different stallions and, remarkably, four of the five have already produced a graded winner (the exception being her A.P. Indy mare Possibility, who has a couple of black-type winners to her credit).

My Flag leads the way amongst these daughters, as she emulated Personal Ensign’s considerable feat of replicating her Breeders’ Cup success as a broodmare. Her daughter Storm Flag Flying became the third generation of Breeders’ Cup winners when she confirmed her status as 2002’s champion 2-year-old filly in the GI Juvenile Fillies. Appropriately Storm Flag Flying went on to win the GI Personal Ensign H. as a 4-year-old, when she was also second in the GI Breeders’ Cup Distaff.

Personal Ensign’s Unbridled filly Salute was also above average, as she showed when placed at two in the GII Demoiselle S. and GIII Tempted S. She visited Pulpit to produce Mr Speaker.

Title Seeker, Personal Ensign=s unraced daughter by Monarchos, made a bright start as a broodmare, her first foal being Seeking the Title, a Grade I-placed winner of the GIII Iowa Oaks.

Pennant Champion’s contribution was her Arch filly Animal Spirits, winner of the GIII Bourbon S. on turf as a 2-year-old. Pennant Champion also has several talented broodmare daughters. One, the Broad Brush mare Broad Pennant, is dam of the smart Broken Vow colt Interactif (third in the GII Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf before winning the GII National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame S.). Another, the Forestry filly Rejoicing, also has a smart turf performer by Broken Vow, namely this year’s GIII American Derby winner Divine Oath.

The daughter of Pennant Champion responsible for Ocho Ocho Ocho is Winner, a Horse Chestnut mare who changed hands for $700,000 at Keeneland earlier this month. Royal Oak Farm made the successful bid for the 12-year-old, who is in foal to Bernardini.

Horse Chestnut, of course, represented one of Claiborne Farm’s admirable (but ultimately unsuccessful) attempts to introduce some new bloodlines to Kentucky. They were no doubt hoping that he would develop into another Forli. Like Forli, Horse Chestnut had also shown great versatility, but in South Africa not Argentina.

A grandson of Sadler’s Wells, Horse Chestnut had won eight of his nine starts in South Africa, from five furlongs to a mile and a half, in the process of earning Horse of the Year honors.

Like Forli, Horse Chestnut also created quite a stir in winning his first start in the U.S., the GIII Broward H. over 1 1/16 miles on his dirt-track debut at the start of 2000. This impressive victory raised realistic hopes that Horse Chestnut was going to prove just as brilliant in his new base as he had been in South Africa, but an injury in a workout ended his career just a couple of weeks later. Horse Chestnut was returned to South Africa in 2009, his legacy in North America amounting to five graded winners headed by the Grade I turf winner Lucifer’s Stone.

It remains to be seen whether Ocho Ocho Ocho possesses sufficient talent to develop into a Triple Crown contender, but there can be no doubt that he possesses enough stamina to do so.

With the Kentucky Derby and GI Travers S. winner Street Sense as his sire and the South African Derby winner Horse Chestnut as his broodmare sire, he is virtually guaranteed to stay at least a mile and a quarter.

Personal Ensign numbered two victories in the 10-furlong Beldame S. among her eight Grade I victories and her high-class brother Personal Flag took the GI Widener and GI Suburban H. over the same distance. Then there’s the Jockey Club Gold Cup winner Miner’s Mark, who was a brother to Ocho Ocho Ocho’s second dam Pennant Champion. No wonder Ocho Ocho Ocho stayed on so well at the end of a mile and a sixteenth at Delta Downs.