Silver Max runs to his pedigree

Silver Max winning the Transylvania-G3 at Keeneland
Photo:  Coady Photography, Courtesy of Keeneland

Silver Max burst out of the gate in the Grade III grassy Transylvania yesterday, and never looked back until he cleared the finish line.  His six rivals seemed content to let the three-year-old Badge of Silver colt gallop loose on the lead in the early part of the mile-and-a-sixteenth contest, apparently believing either that they would catch him on the turn or that he’d falter in the stretch. 

By the time they figured out that Silver Max wouldn’t easily relinquish his advantage, there wasn’t enough time to reach him.  He won by five and a half lengths in 1:41.80 and earned $60,000 for the effort, capturing his first stakes race and the first added-money event of the Keeneland spring meet on a beautiful opening day.

Silver Max could have been claimed for $50,000 in his career debut: a five-and-a-half furlong maiden race on Saratoga’s main track last July, when he was piloted by Robby Albarado, the jockey who rode him to victory yesterday.  He finished second that day, as he did in his next four attempts in maiden special weight company at varying distances on the grass, finally breaking his maiden in a one-mile maiden special weight race over firm turf at Gulfstream Park in January. 

Two weeks later, Silver Max ambitiously encountered some of the best colts of his crop in the Grade III Holy Bull, where he finished a tiring fifth over a sloppy mile to Bernardini’s Algorithms, who decisively defeated last year’s Two-Year-Old Champion, Hansen. 

Trainer Dale Romans wisely regrouped and ran Silver Max back to his strength six weeks later in a grassy allowance/optional claimer at the Transylvania distance, and he ran as he did yesterday, winning in wire-to-wire style by three widening lengths at Gulfstream.  The bay colt has now won or placed in eight of his nine starts, and bankrolled $169,475.

That’s a nice return on the $20,000 that Dale Romans paid for him at the 2010 Fasig-Tipton July sale.  Silver Max is the fifth foal and third winner from the winning Kissin Kris mare, Kissin Rene, a half-sister to graded stakes-winning Prince of the Mt. and to the dams of Canadian Champion Kiss a Native and Grade I stakes winner and sire Yes It’s True.  Kissin Rene has also produced the stakes-winning filly, True Kiss, by Yes It’s True’s sire, Is It True. 

Silver Max’s female family had been a relatively quiet one until his third dam, the Colorado-bred Party Date (by the obscure Speedy Frank) was bred to Prince of Ascot, and then it exploded.  The resulting foal was Silver Max’s second dam, Monique Rene, a tough Louisiana-bred stakes-winning sprint specialist who notched 29 races in 45 starts while earning $456,250.  Her descendants appear to have inherited her speed, and perhaps, her distance limitations.

With his victory in the Transylvania, Silver Max became the second North American graded stakes winner for his sire, the fourth-crop Silver Deputy stallion Badge of Silver, a fast, versatile performer who was effective in elite company on both dirt and turf at middle distances up to nine furlongs, capturing the Grade II New Orleans (dirt) and San Gabriel (turf) Handicaps in the colors of Ken and Sarah Ramsey.  At four, and again at six, he placed in the Cigar Mile-G1, and in his penultimate start, he was third to Turf Champion Miesque’s Approval in the Grade I Breeders’ Cup Mile.    He stands at Airdrie for a published fee of $6,000.

Like Badge of Silver’s son, Fly Lexis Fly, a two-time Grade I winner in Peru who is currently being pointed to the Belmont, Silver Max is inbred to Classic Chef-de-Race Roberto, 4 x 4.  Badge of Silver’s dam, Silveroo, is a daughter of Roberto’s son, Silver Hawk, while Silver Max’s broodmare sire, Kissin Kris, is also by Roberto. 

True Nicks rates the match that produced Silver Max as an A++, and indeed, there is precedent for the cross.  Among the other stakes winners that have been bred on a similar pattern are the stakes-winning fillies Beso Grande (by Mass Media) and Devonspaintedlady (by Devon Deputy), both out of Kissin Kris mares.  When bred to daughters or granddaughters of Roberto, Deputy Minister’s son, Touch Gold, has sired stakes winners Sharp Susan (out of Winter’s Gone, by Dynaformer), Flaming Heart (out of Hot Lear, by Lear Fan), and Adobe Gold (out of Urus, by Kris S.).

What makes Hansen run?

In a stunner, Hansen defeated heavy favorite Union Rags
in the 2011 Breeders' Cup Juvenile
Photo:  Reed Palmer Photography/Churchill Downs

Breeders’ Cup Juvenile winner Hansen’s four-generation catalogue-style pedigree fits neatly on just a half page, and save for the white colt’s own record, it’s virtually lacking in black type or distinguished runners.  So where did he get the class to beat the likes of proven Grade I winners such as Union Rags, Creative Cause, Crusade, Drill and Dullahan? 

It’s hard to say. 

Hansen’s dam, Stormy Sunday, by Sir Cat, broke her maiden in her first start in a lowly $5000 claimer at Turfway Park in February, 2005, stopping the timer in a pedestrian 1:14.02.  She was haltered out of that race by Hansen’s current owner, Dr. Kendall Hansen, and by June of that year, showed dramatic improvement, winning a $30,000 claiming race at Churchill in 1:10.29.  Stepped up to face allowance foes in a six-and-a-half furlong contest just three weeks later, Stormy Sunday finished a tiring third.  In what would be the fourth and final start of her career that August, she captured a five-and-a-half furlong starter allowance over a muddy strip at Mountaineer, finishing up in 1:04.34.

Bred to Tapit in 2007, Stormy Sunday produced a bay colt, Tapanna, who never started at two, but broke his maiden this year in his fifth start, in an eight-furlong maiden special weight test at Turfway last September. 

Hansen is the mare’s second foal by Tapit, and couldn’t be more different than his older brother, not only in color, but in ability.  Such are the vagaries of genetics.

Tapit has established an enviable record at stud by consistently upgrading the mares to whom he has been bred.  And he did it again with Stormy Sunday when he sired Hansen, the product of an oft-successful nick with mares by Storm Cat and his sons.  In addition to Hansen, Tapit has two other Grade I stakes winners bred on this pattern: Careless Jewel (out of Sweet and Careless, by Hennessy) and Tell A Kelly (out of Evrobi, by Tabasco Cat).  Like Hansen, both are inbred to both Northern Dancer and to Secretariat, maternal grandsire of the dams of both A. P. Indy and Storm Cat. 

The cross between Tapit’s sire, Pulpit, and Storm Cat has also produced Florida Derby winner Ice Box (out of Spice Island, by Tabasco Cat) and successful sire Sky Mesa (out of Caress, by Storm Cat), who captured the Hopeful.

Though the chartcaller noted that Hansen “lasted” to win the mile-and-a-sixteenth Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, with a final quarter in 25.37, his ability to compete at classic distances is still an open question.  There is an abundance of stamina flowing through the family of his maternal grandsire, the turf specialist Sir Cat, whose second second dam is the great Champion April Run (Ire), who won the Turf Classic and was third in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.  And Temperence Hill, the sire of Hansen’s third dam, Tescudera, won the Belmont, the Suburban, the Travers, and the Jockey Club Gold Cup. But these influences don’t appear until Hansen’s fourth generation, perhaps too far back to be of vital importance.

Based on his three races to-date, Hansen looks more like a sprinter who has been able to carry his speed up to a mile and a sixteenth than a true classic horse who has the cardiovascular and biomechanical equipment to stay a mile and a quarter.   Time will tell, of course, as it always does.