If you like Empire Maker as a stallion for $75,000 — which I do — then you gotta love his three-quarter brother First Defence, entering stud in 2009 at $17,500 at Juddmonte Farm.
Grade 1 winner First Defence is by Grade 1 winner Unbridled’s Song out of Grade 1 winner Honest Lady, by Grade 1 winner Seattle Slew. Honest Lady is a half-sister to Grade 1 winner Empire Maker, already sire of two Grade 1 winners, and to Grade 1 winner Chester House, also sire of two Grade 1 winners. His second dam is Grade 1 winner Toussaud, a Broodmare of the Year!
Unlike Empire Maker and Chester House, both route horses, First Defence was a sprinter, like his dam. His sire can also get some very fast horses, so this makes First Defence a great fit for the U.S. commercial market.
In 2008, at age 4, First Defence won two graded sprint stakes – one of them a Grade 1 – to secure a place at stud as one of the most attractive stallion prospects from the crop of 2004. One of those sprints, the 6-furlong, Grade 3 Jaipur at Belmont Park, was contested over a yielding turf course, which gives the colt multiple-surface prospects as a stallion. And yielding turf notwithstanding, First Defence put up some serious fractions to win the Jaipur – 21.93, 44.84, 56.77, and 1:09.48– although he was all out to hold on at the end by a short head. (Family note: Toussaud won a sprint on the turf, as did Honest Lady.)
In contrast to the Jaipur result, First Defense won the 7-furlong, Grade 1 Forego at Saratoga by 6 ¾ lengths. Again, he posted some sizzling fractions — 22.53, 44.61, 1:08.49, and 1:21.55 – and earned a 109 Beyer figure. He did get lucky because favorite Lucky Island was unlucky to miss the break, but the way he ran makes me think that no one would have come near him that day.
In fact, WTC Inc.’s New York-based speed handicapper agrees: “He freaked that day. No way anyone catches him, including Lucky Island on a good day. Frankel had been down on [First Defence] a bit because he’d been slowing down at the end of his races, but if you look back at it there were reasons for it. In the Jaipur the colt went 44 and change on a soft course – anyone would slow down on that. In his route races, like the Longbranch, we know now that he didn’t like the distance, yet he won. Six or 7 [furlongs] was what he liked, and at that distance he was pretty darn good.”
A simple reading of First Defence’s race record reveals this: 14 starts, 6 wins, 3 seconds, $580,534 in earnings; won Grade 1 Forego, won Grade 3 Jaipur (turf), won Listed Longbranch, 2nd in Grade 1 King’s Bishop, 2nd in Grade 2 Alfred G. Vanderbilt.
A Grade 1 winner on dirt, a graded winner on turf, and an outstanding workhorse on synthetics, First Defence brings serious front-end speed and class to the table as a sire prospect. Now add the powerful physique, throw in the sire, Unbridled’s Song, whose two 2-year-old sons Midshipman and Old Fashioned are serious Derby prospects, and then mix in the Seattle Slew dam, herself a Grade 1 winner and another seriously fast horse whose half-brothers Chester House and Empire Maker have already sired serious racehorses, and what you get is one heck of a serious stallion prospect. First Defence will stand for $17,500 in 2009, and, in my opinion, he’s worth every penny of it.