Pan Zareta--the race mare disqualified

[vineyridge]

Was reading the AQHA Journal (Feb. 2011)and learned to my amazement that PZ was not a purebred TB. The AQHA article says that her dam line is Quarter mares.

So we have a horse who would not be allowed on a TB race track who is in the Racing Hall of Fame and buried in the infield of a TB race track. One of the greatest of all race horses in North American history couldn't race today in organized racing as we think of it. (Don't want to go into her being sent to run in AQHA racing).

The second place in today's Grand Steeplechase de Paris is an SFAA; the winner has Mr. P x No. D. Race is supposed to have been crackerjack. But here they wouldn't have been allowed on the track together.

Does anyone else feel that the pure TB rules here are misguided? Brits/Irish don't have them nor do the French or Aussies.

Why do we?

[Bast]

Was reading the AQHA Journal (Feb. 2011)and learned to my amazement that PZ was not a purebred TB. The AQHA article says that her dam line is Quarter mares.

So we have a horse who would not be allowed on a TB race track who is in the Racing Hall of Fame and buried in the infield of a TB race track. One of the greatest of all race horses in North American history couldn't race today in organized racing as we think of it. (Don't want to go into her being sent to run in AQHA racing).

The second place in today's Grand Steeplechase de Paris is an SFAA; the winner has Mr. P x No. D. Race is supposed to have been crackerjack. But here they wouldn't have been allowed on the track together.

Does anyone else feel that the pure TB rules here are misguided? Brits/Irish don't have them nor do the French or Aussies.

Why do we?

The pedigree of Pan Zareta's 3rd dam illustrates the "holes" in her lineage:

http://www.pedigreequery.com/sallie+johnson

Some other countries have rules allowing the registration and racing of horses that do not qualify as full-blooded (8 generations) in a separate part of the registry. Some of these lines eventually migrate into the TB stud books of those countries after enough generations.

Pan Zareta isn't the only case of a not-quite-TB racing as one in that era. There is the case of Peter McCue:

http://www.pedigreequery.com/peter+mccue

Read the notes to his pedigree.

[Pan Zareta]

Was reading the AQHA Journal (Feb. 2011)and learned to my amazement that PZ was not a purebred TB. The AQHA article says that her dam line is Quarter mares.

.

That female family, ap1, has produced stakes winners at up to a mile.

Had more 19th century Texas breeders been reporting to Bruce, and early 20th century English turfmen less disdainful of those lines that didn't trace back to a mare in their beloved GSB, PZ would have been duly recorded in the main body of the ASB, and regarded no differently than any other TB with American lines in their pedigrees.

Pan Zareta isn't the only case of a not-quite-TB racing as one in that era. There is the case of Peter McCue:

Peter McCue's pedigree was most likely exactly as it's entered here, typical, regionally bred, late 19th cent. American TB. But he figured in the pedigrees of ~75% of the first 556 AQHA registrants. A majority of the AQHA directors in the 1940s were of the misguided conviction that no TB could have gotten the progeny that he did. That was probably the argument used in obtaining the affidavit from the breeder's son, which contradicts the entry in his father's personal records (and later in ASB 7) showing the horse as "by Duke", not "by Dan".

[vineyridge]

Do we know why the JC discontinued the Appendix book? Because if they hadn't, North America would have "mixed" racing like the rest of the World.

[Pan Zareta]

Do we know why the JC discontinued the Appendix book? Because if they hadn't, North America would have "mixed" racing like the rest of the World.

All I know is that it was a stewards' decision. The JC is a private org. and not obliged to explain their reasoning. The old appendix rules were established in the 1890s to allow horses that were competitive, but ASB ineligible, to run at JC-sanctioned tracks & events. They had to some extent outlived their purpose by 1932. The number of appendix registrants had dwindled to almost nothing compared to the level of the late 1890s. The 'for racing purposes only' registrations weren't completely eliminated. They're still used, but only under special circumstances.

I suspect that the main effect of mixed racing in the US would be significant expansion of TB & QH running together at distances of 3-5f. If there's a sizable number of NTBs here that would be competitive at classic distance, I'm unaware of it.

[vineyridge]

I was actually thinking of chasing. It might reduce the dwindling of that sort of race since part bred hunter/eventer types would be allowed to run. It seems stupid to me that Hunt Clubs have racing weekends but most of their horses are not eligible to run in sanctioned races.

[Linda_d]

Was reading the AQHA Journal (Feb. 2011)and learned to my amazement that PZ was not a purebred TB. The AQHA article says that her dam line is Quarter mares.

So we have a horse who would not be allowed on a TB race track who is in the Racing Hall of Fame and buried in the infield of a TB race track. One of the greatest of all race horses in North American history couldn't race today in organized racing as we think of it. (Don't want to go into her being sent to run in AQHA racing).

The second place in today's Grand Steeplechase de Paris is an SFAA; the winner has Mr. P x No. D. Race is supposed to have been crackerjack. But here they wouldn't have been allowed on the track together.

Does anyone else feel that the pure TB rules here are misguided? Brits/Irish don't have them nor do the French or Aussies.

Why do we?

I'd guess it has to do with economics, politics, and prejudice, but primarily economics, ie limiting the supply. BTW, Britain hasn't always been so "liberal" about allowing horses into the GSB, especially American horses.

Between 1915 and the late 1940s, most American TBs were ineligible for registration in the GSB and ineligible to race in Britain. This stemmed from the Jersey Act, which said that no horse was eligible for the GSB if all ancestors didn't trace to horses in the GSB. It was a reaction to the glut of American TBs that were imported into Britain a decade before WW I when reformers shut down racing in New York and several prominent American breeders brought their stock to Europe, most notably Britain and France.

Ironically, Americus, an American TB inbred 4 x 4 to Lexington and imported into Britain prior to the Jersey Act, put American blood into many British TBs through his daughter Americus Girl, granddam of Mumtaz Mahal at the very time that the Brits were banning other American TBs with similar breeding.

[Pan Zareta]

Ironically, Americus, an American TB inbred 4 x 4 to Lexington and imported into Britain prior to the Jersey Act, put American blood into many British TBs through his daughter Americus Girl, granddam of Mumtaz Mahal at the very time that the Brits were banning other American TBs with similar breeding.

...and Mumtaz Mahal was the 2nd dam of *Nasrullah, leading sire here and in GB. His sire's side was equally "Americanized". Nearco was GSB eligible only b/c his 3d dam Sibola (USA, 1896) had been accepted into the GSB before the Jersey Act. She was a 12th gen. American-bred descendant of DeLancey's Cub *Mare, and had about as many question marks in her pedigree as Americus.

[Bast]

American bloodlines are also present in the breeding of Marcel Boussac. Refer to the pedigree of Tourbillon:

http://www.pedigreequery.com/tourbillon

[vineyridge]

I was under the impression that NT's, including the dreaded Americans were eligible to race in Britain even under the Jersey Act, but their offspring had to be registered in the Weatherby's Non-Thoroughbred Registry. I believe that the French had no such prejudices, and when so many US breeders went to Europe when race gambling was banned in so many states here, the French were happy to cross breed with American mares (mostly mares). Then WWI came along and the Jersey Act went into effect, and many of the emigrant breeders came home and brought their breeding stock (mostly mares) back with them.

I've always believed that one reason Nearco's get and Tourbillon's and Lady Josephine's descendants were so successful in North America is that they brought our genes back to us.

Perhaps one reason we don't have an appendix book or the ability to enter new TBs in the American Stud Book is a consequence of the Jersey Act and export considerations.

[diomed]

You know, speaking of old American bloodlines...
Even the great Euro Princequillo has Lexington in his veins.
You can find it in Rose Prince's dam side. Look for the stallion Mars.
http://www.pedigreequery.com/rose+prince