January 2000

California Stallions Riding High

Riding the wave of enthusiasm over California-breds, a number of California stallions also thrived in 1999. Without final figures at press time, General Meeting will top all California sires in the money won category with more than $4 million in progeny earnings last year. The son of Seattle Slew-Alydar's Promise, by Alydar, was represented in 1999 by multiple grade I winners General Challenge and Excellent Meeting.

Through mid-December, General Meeting's progeny earnings amounted to $4.1 million with a healthy average earnings per starter of $53,628. General Meeting stands at Golden Eagle Farm in Ramona.

Cee's Tizzy and Olympio ranked second and third, respectively, in early December in the money won category. Cee's Tizzy, bolstered by graded stakes winners Budroyale and Gourmet Girl, boasted earnings of $3,050,430. His 68 runners had made 443 starts and won a total of 67 races through Dec. 4. Cee's Tizzy stands at Harris Farms in Coalinga. Olympio, meanwhile, stands at JZ Stock Farm. The son of Naskra out of Carols Christmas, had earnings of $2,614,096 from 113 runners through the same date.

Bertrando also enjoyed a sensational season. California's leading sire of two-year-olds, Bertrando's 21 juvenile runners captured 19 races in 70 starts and earned $738,091. As the River Edge Farm advertising campaign attests, Bertrando is the first California third-crop sire to surpass $2 million in a single season.

In Excess (Ire) ranked second in two-year-olds by money won and stands at Vessels Stallion Farm in Bonsall.

Half Term, another Golden Eagle Farm stallion, from only 11 runners also ranked with the leading sires of two-year-olds with earnings of $224,987. Ridgeley Farm stallion Memo (Chi) has proven to be a sire of precocious athletes. His eight two-year-olds earned $181,790 while winning six races in 22 starts in 1999.

New Blood
California is also welcoming a host of new stallions to the state for 2000. Leading the list of rookies is California Horse of the Year Free House. The charismatic son of Smokester stands his first season at stud at Vessels Stallion Farm. Following is a list of new California sires for 2000.

General Challenge and Cliquot Rebound at Hollywood Park

by DEBRA GINSBURG
and MICHAEL COMPTON

A pair of promising three-year-olds strutted their immense talents at Hollywood Park in December. Both General Challenge and Cliquot sported victories in the win column after their respective work was done over the Inglewood oval (now owned by Churchill Downs), and both California-breds should make plenty of noise in the Handicap division in 2000.

Cliquot stole an easy lead in the $100,000 On Trust Handicap against state breds Dec. 4. Under jockey Corey Nakatani, he set the pace throughout the 7 1/2-furlong contest and drew away to a 4 1/2-length win. Cal Cup Sprint hero Love That Red was second and longshot Indiahoma finished third. Cavonnier and Del Mar Gray were among the also-rans.

"I wanted to let the horse run his race and ride him with confidence," Nakatani said following the race. "He was comfortable, but he was going fast enough that the horses who were chasing him couldn't run him down. He was pretty impressive today, and hopefully he is ready for bigger and better things."

The Bertrando gelding was making his first start since he trailed home in the La Jolla Handicap on the Del Mar turf in August. He has been freshened since that disappointing performance and was obviously primed for a top effort.

"I was glad to see him run like he did last spring," said John Shirreffs, who trains Cliquot for Marshall Naify's 505 Farms. "He had a little bleeding problem in his last race, so I was relieved to see him run like he did. I was worried if he was fit enough, but he's always been a horse who, when he's right, has a lot of air in him."

Winner earlier this year of the El Camino Real Derby (over eventual Kentucky Derby winner Charismatic) and Snow Chief Stakes, Cliquot has now won four of his seven outings and placed on two other occasions, including a third in the Wood Memorial Stakes at Aqueduct. He has earnings of $429,200.

General Challenge, eager to redeem a dismal tenth-place finish in the Breeders' Cup Classic in November, was sent off as the odds-on favorite in the Native Diver Handicap Dec. 12. The Golden Eagle Farm colorbearer drew the outside post in the compact six-horse field and also sported a new rider in Chris McCarron. The rangy son of California's leading sire General Meeting broke with the field and settled down in fourth position early, a few lengths behind Moore's Flat.

As the field rounded the far turn in the 1 1/8-mile event, McCarron roused General Challenge. The big chestnut responded gamely and went after the leaders three deep in the stretch. A stubborn Moore's Flat did not throw in the towel without a fight. Under aggressive handling from Kent Desormeaux, the pacesetter nearly registered a 44-1 upset, but General Challenge had the last word. Inside the sixteenth pole, McCarron got General Challenge's attention with some strong riding of his own and this year's Santa Anita Derby and Pacific Classic victor surged past Moore's Flat close home to score a hard-fought neck victory. It was another 4 lengths back to Koslanin (Arg) in third.

"Down the stretch it looked like he wasn't going to pass that horse," said trainer Bob Baffert. "But when Chris hit him left-handed, I think it got his attention right there. That other horse ran a career race."

As for McCarron, he was thrilled to partner a probable California champion.

"It was fun," he said. "I was certainly happy to get the mount and even happier now that he won.

"He's a fast horse," he added. "He got a little excited going to the post but he ran his race. When I asked him he gave me the acceleration you look for. But we had to work harder than I thought we would."

The win was worth $60,000 to General Challenge and it boosts his career bankroll to more than $1.6 million. Next up for General Challenge is likely the San Fernando Stakes at Santa Anita this month.

Cal-breds Theresa's Tizzy and Funallover led the Corona Handicap field to the wire Dec. 18. Under the man of the meet Laffit Pincay, Theresa's Tizzy led the field of eight wire to wire and crossed the finish 3 1/2 lengths ahead of a fast-closing Funallover. Race favorite Stop Traffic finished sixth.

Theresa's Tizzy is a 5-year-old gray mare by Cee's Tizzy out of the stakes-winning mare Theresa's Pleasure. She is owned by Bellestri, Johnson, Leach, et al, and is trained by Noble Threewitt.


Pedigree Profile: General Meeting

Led by Grade I winners General Challenge and Excellent Meeting, General Meeting led all California sires in 1999 by money won.

by ELLEN PARKER

Racing fans of the 1990's have been so bitterly teased by possible Triple Crowns, it is easy to forget a time when Triple Crowns came three to a decade.

The most recent time this occurred of course was when Secretariat, Seattle Slew and Affirmed turned the trick in 1973, 1977 and 1978 respectively.

Triple Crown winners have always been something of a disappointment at stud. Sir Barton was a failure, Assault was sterile. War Admiral and Count Fleet were good broodmare sires, but Gallant Fox will probably always be best known as the sire of Omaha, who himself was not much of a sire. Calumet's greats, Citation and Whirlaway, never established strong sire lines and their names are rarely seen in pedigrees.

Our more recent Triple Crown winners have done better so far. Secretariat is an excellent broodmare sire; Affirmed has been a solid horse and a good turf sire; but it was left to Seattle Slew of all the great Triple Crown winners in history, to establish a strong male line, or rather to continue one.

Few could fault Slew's race record. He was an unbeaten champion at two and is still the only American horse to race unbeaten through a Triple Crown. His defeat in the 1977 Swaps Stakes led to an abrubtly ended sophomore campaign, then an illness over the winter nearly cost him his life and caused him to begin his handicap campaign late the following season.

Seattle Slew overcame his setbacks, however, and returned to become the first Triple Crown winner in history to defeat another, handing Affirmed resounding defeats in both the Marlboro Cup and Jockey Club Gold Cup. Slew did not win the latter, however, but went under by the slimmest of noses to ill-fated Exceller in a race which would become known as his hallmark for courage. After setting suicidal early fractions, Slew seemed an easy target for late-charging Exceller, who was closing from well off the pace with a full head of steam. Exceller should have blown by him, would have blown by another horse, but Slew would not let him, came again, and just missed. A stride past the wire, Slew once more had the lead.

When the big bay headed to stud, there were more than a few doubters, largely those who judged him more by his auction price of $17,500 than his pedigree, for few horses had more pedigree ammunition than Seattle Slew, who was inbred to Myrtlewood and her half sister Black Curl and to full sisters Striking and Busher. Lines and crosses of the most accomplished families in the stud book like Alanesian, Aloe, Humanity, Lavendula and Galla Colors graced his pedigree. To any serious student of pedigree, Seattle Slew simply could not fail.

He has, of course, been a glory of a stallion, getting champions like A. P. Indy, Slew O' Gold, Capote, Swale and Landaluce. In the minimum amount of time, his sons also began to show up on sire lists and so many of them have now sired stakes winners that it is often enough to simply say that a horse is by Seattle Slew and the mares will come.

General Meeting was not one of Seattle Slew's better racehorses, but he was certainly a good one. He was precocious enough at two to place in the Hollywood Futurity and at three he won the Volante Handicap and Bradbury Stakes. But a Grade 1 win eluded him, and since his female family was not loaded with top sires in the first few generations, it was difficult to judge his potential.

Those who were unsure of him did not look deep enough. General Meeting traces back to a Lexington mare named La Henderson, a foal of 1865, and his twelfth dam. The sub-branch of mares from which he descends belongs to the 1950 mare Johann by Johnstown, dam of Strub Series winner Hillsdale and ancestress of the good sire Carson City, who is bred on the same Raise A Native-Summertime Promise cross as the dam of General Meeting.

Another, better known, group of mares from this family traces to the mare Khara, champion two-year-old filly of 1927 and ancestress of good sires like Habitat, Northfields, and Dancer's Image. Khara's dam, Decree, is a full sister to Anna Horton, seventh dam of General Meeting. So the potential was there for this group of mares to spawn a good sire and Carson City's emergence signaled that the promise had become reality.

From the very beginning, it was obvious that one of the things that Seattle Slew liked in his mates was another cross of *La Troienne, something that occurred in Slew o' Gold, Adored, A. P. Indy, Hail Atlantis, Savannah Slew, Sweet Slew, Slew The Knight, Al Mundhir, Fast Play, Digression, Houston, Glowing Honor and Seaside Attraction, to name just a few. Additionally, he also exhibited a liking for another cross of Frizette to go with his Myrtlewood/Black Curl cross, an aspect which appears in horses like Claxton's Slew, Slew's Royalty, Compelling Sound, Bitooh, Nelson, Cyrano, Event Of The Year and General Meeting himself.

Because Mr. Prospector also descended from Myrtlewood (his third dam, Miss Dogwood, is a half sister to Crepe Myrtle, fourth dam of Seattle Slew), this cross seemed a natural and also began to work with Slew's sons, with horses like Capote (Acceptable, Capote Belle, Agincourt, True Flare, She's Tops) and A. P. Indy (Tomisue's Delight, Pulpit, Lu Ravi, Accelerator) showing a natural affinity for this cross.

General Meeting has been a little more versatile. Of his seven top runners, four (Excellent Meeting, Magical Allure, Time To Meet and Career Collection) have another *La Troienne cross. Three have linebreeding to Frizette: Sunday Stroll; Daring General and Magical Allure. All have other interesting patterns as well.

Grade 1 winner General Challenge is sex-balance inbred to Northern Dancer and is linebred to Lavendula and Native Dancer. He also is inbred to Olympia and linebred to Bull Lea and to Fairway and Pharos.

Excellent Meeting, also a Grade 1 winner, in addition to her three crosses of *La Troienne, is inbred to full sisters Two Lea and Twosy and to three-quarter brothers Nearctic x2/Indian Hemp. Her female family has in the last year also produced another good horse by Seattle Slew himself, Doneraile Court.

Sunday Stroll has a most interesting pedigree in that he has two crosses of Bold Ruler and another of his full sister, Eastern Princess. He is also linebred to Lavendula and his dam is inbred to Graustark. He has four crosses of Frizette in all.

Time To Meet has the closest *La Troienne pattern as she carries full sisters Striking x2/Busher on a 6 x 6 x 5 pattern. All are out of Baby League and she also has another *La Troienne daughter, Businesslike via Buckpasser. She has four lines of Lavendula and is inbed to full siblings Aloe and Foxlaw as well.

Grade 2 placed Daring General has a different look. He is 5 x 5 to half siblings Hillbrook and Hillsdale and has three crosses of half sisters Lady Angela x2/Sybil's Sister. He is also sex-balance inbred to Northern Dancer, Native Dancer and to Round Table and has four crosses of Lavendula.

Career Collection, a double Grade 2 winner, has four *La Troienne crosses; Baby League x2/Bimelech/Belle of Troy. Her dam is inbred to half siblings Azalea and Pavot and she is linebred to *Mahmoud and his three-quarter sister Mumtaz Mahal, the dam of *Nasrullah and second dam of *Royal Charger. She is another who has a double of Olympia.

Magical Allure has three *La Troienne crosses and four Frizette crosses, but another less obvious cross occurrs via Miss Disco, dam of Bold Ruler, and Conniver, Magical Allure's own third dam. Both of these mares are daughters of Discovery and their dams are bred on a similar Swynford/Sweep cross.

When Seattle Slew retired to stud, it was also noted that he came from a very short-lived sire line. His sire, Bold Reasoning died at seven, his sire Boldnesian at 12, his sire Bold Ruler at 17 and his sire *Nasrullah at 19. But thanks to General Meeting and other successful sons, Seattle Slew, who will turn 26 in 2000, will remain alive far longer than anyone could possibly have predicted.

Shock Wave Therapy for Horses:
A Study in California

by HEATHER THOMAS

A new kind of treatment for several types of lameness (hock problems such as bone spavin, navicular syndrome, bucked shins, and certain tendon and ligament injuries) is now being used in horses, utilizing shock (pressure) waves generated by a special machine. This technology is called lithotripsy, which means to break up stones, and has been used in human medicine since 1980 to treat kidney and bladder stones.

Shock wave therapy, or ESWL (Extracorporal Shock Wave Lithotripsy, has been used in Europe for a number of years on humans and horses, but has only been available in the U.S. for treating horses since early 1998. The first machine here was set up at Interstate Equine Services Inc. at Goldsby, Oklahoma, and a study was begun (January 1998) to identify specific conditions that commonly cause lameness, determine the degree of lameness, apply the treatment with ESWL, and then monitor and report the results.

Dr. David McCarroll, who works with the unit, gave a presentation at a Sportsmedicine meeting in Reno, Nevada (September 1999) and reported on 47 horses in which he treated hocks (bone spavin affecting the distal tarsal joints-somewhat similar to heel spurs in humans, since the hock joint is basically the same as the human ankle). Of those 47 horses, 40 showed improvement following the shock wave therapy; they improved at least one lameness grade or regained soundness and were able to perform again at their previous athletic levels.

A second machine is now in use at Purdue University in Indiana, under the direction of Dr. Scott McClure, and a third began operation December 1999 at Santa Lucia Equine Clinic in Santa Ynez, California, operated by Dr. Vandell E. Snow. Snow is in charge of a controlled study to further evaluate the responses of horses to shock wave therapy in certain types of lameness.

Snow says this is a controlled study being done through Colorado State University, under direction of C. Wayne McIlwraith, BVSc, MS, PhD, FRCVS. Originally from New Zealand, McIlwraith is Professor of Surgery at Colorado State, Director of Equine Sciences, and co-director of the Orthopedic Research Program in the Department of Clinical Sciences.

According to Snow, they were reluctant to do the study at the university because their case load was not as full as they wanted it to be in order to get a good study, so McIlwraith recommended that the machine be located at Dr. Snow's clinic in California. "We have a large case load here," says Snow, "I will be doing the work on it, and Dr. McIlwraith and I will publish the results." The first cases were scheduled for the week of December 14, 1999.

"This type of therapy seems to provide relief for arthritic problems in the lower joints of the hock, and to provide relief from navicular in certain cases," says Snow. "We also feel, based on some work that has been done in Germany, that it is helpful in horses that have high suspensory disease. These are three problems we will address in our study, and we will monitor the horses' response to therapy. We feel it may be helpful in other things, also, so a fourth problem we'll look at is stress fractures in the cannon bone. I do a lot of racehorses, and we have seen some promising results in early cases of these."

He says, "We'll have a very regimented work-up on the cases, so the case selection is well documented, what kinds of lesions they have, how long the problem has been going on, and good follow-up. Our goal is to investigate the shock wave therapy's effectiveness in those four conditions."

The treatment requires a lameness examination and diagnosis to pinpoint the problem, using nerve blocks, radiographs or flexion tests if necessary, and then the horse is put under general anesthetic for the shock wave therapy. It takes one to 1.5 hours of anesthesia time. The horse must be under anesthesia because the treatment causes some sensation when the pressure waves hit the bone (or ligament) and the horse must not move. The waves are focused on the specific area to be treated. This type of therapy is non-invasive, with no blood loss nor risk of infection.

Snow says that "Dr. McClure at Purdue has treated quite a few cases, and Dr. McCarroll in Oklahoma has done more than anyone-he's had it the longest in this country-and is favorably impressed with the results. There are more than one kind of machine available; this shock wave machine is one that can deliver a lot of energy to an area and is the most powerful, and it can also deliver a low dose. It has a wide range of doses it can deliver."

"In Europe veterinarians have been using another machine, which is not able to deliver as much energy. They've been using it in standing horses for suspensory and tendon problems with good results. But that particular machine is not suited for bone problems because it doesn't have the capacity; the way it generates the shock waves is different. Our machine produces the shock waves with a spark gap, like a spark plug." says Snow.

The pressure waves are generated by the discharge of a high voltage spark from an electrode, under water, then channeled and focused to pass through living tissues. The pressure waves travel through water or soft tissues, and when they hit something of a different density, like bone, they have an effect on it. The European machines, however, use a different mechanism with electric crystals, says Snow, and can't produce the same amount of power.

"What we are trying to do is use the machine that gives us the most energy, so we can have a wider range of selection so we can investigate how much energy might be needed for certain cases and how effective it is. It will be at least a year or two before we have much follow-up. We will follow these horses for five years after their treatment, but we should have some preliminary results within a year. We want to know what the long-term effects will be."

"For instance, if a person has a jumper with navicular disease and is reluctant to nerve the horse and chooses to use this shock wave therapy instead, it would be nice for me, as a veterinarian, to be able to tell you that this therapy would probably be effective for five or six years, or three or four, or whatever," says Snow. "This study will give us some idea of how long the improvement might last. It cheapens a horse if you have to nerve him. In my opinion, nerving (if it is done correctly) is not a big safety issue, but in the minds of a lot of people it is. So that's a drawback, and there are also a lot of complications with nerving, such as neuromas. So if a person has another option for handling the problem-a treatment that will be effective for a reasonable period of time-this would be quite good."

For this particular study, Snow will be treating some horses and have another group of controls, to evaluate the differences. "But it's a little difficult to set this up, because you can't say to one person you are going to treat their horse with shock waves and to the next person say you are not going to treat their horse, to evaluate the difference. The controls are always a difficult thing to get established. But a study like this needs some controls," he says.

Snow says that he himself is not involved much with the scientific community (he's too busy in the field getting things done, and doesn't publish a lot), but Dr. McIlwraith designed the study so that it will have merit and the results can be published in scientific journals and mean something. I do the case selection, the clinical work-ups, the therapies and the follow-ups. As for horse selection, I have a large case load and that's why we are doing it here at this clinic. Information about the study is also on the internet, so a lot of people call, wanting to get on the list and have their horses done-we have a lot of candidates."

There is a lot of pressure for therapy for these kinds of problems, he says. "The cases come in and it's up to me to select the ones that seem to be most suited to this type of therapy. Then we do the follow-up by phone. If the horse is a long ways away we'll work with their veterinarians as far as grading the lamenesses subsequent to therapy. It will be an ongoing thing, and we hope it will cure all these problems. If history of earlier work provides us with anything to go on, we know this therapy will help quite a few horses and not help some, and that's the part we need to sort out."

He says that Dr. McClure and Dr. McCarroll feel that navicular problems with spurs on the wings don't respond as well as the horses with synovial fossa changes. "They feel pretty strongly about that, and I feel that if I have horses with spurs on the wings I may be more reluctant to recommend shock wave therapy. If someone really insists on wanting to try it, that's fine, but I'm not going to promote those for treatment. I always put myself in the owner's position, and I want to get some positive results. But some people may want to try this anyway, instead of nerving the horse. That's one kind of case-about the only kind, however, with that group of horses (in the list of things we work on) that might not be best suited to this type of therapy."

"We may learn more in this study as to what the shock wave therapy will or won't do. My work is with racehorses, hunters, jumpers, reined cow horses and cutting horses, and all of these horses tend to have these kinds of problems on a regular basis, so we will have lots of candidates for a good study," says Snow.

For more information-anyone wanting to learn more about this treatment can contact Dr. Snow, Dr. McClure, or Dr. McCarroll, or visit the website of the company that supplies the ESWL equipment.

Vandall E. Snow (Santa Lucia Clinic, Santa Ynez, California) can be reached at 805-688-3673.
Scott McClure (School of Veterinary Clincal Sciences, Purdue University) can be reached at 765-494-8548.
G. David McCarroll (Interstate Equine Services, Goldsby, Oklahoma) can be reached at 405-288-6267.
The company that provides the shock wave machine has a website that provides information about the procedure; the website address is www.shock-waves-inc.com.