Sons Eligible to Prolong Nile's Fertile Flow

The pharaohs had their pyramids. The Thoroughbred kings, even one cut down as prematurely as Pioneerof The Nile (Empire Maker), instead secure their immortality in the pages of the Stud Book. And if paper seems more vulnerable than stone to the passage of the years, it certifies a far more vital legacy.

Moreover the tragic precedent of the horse who sired the 21st Century's other Triple Crown winner should reprove any attempt, so soon, at a definitive assessment of Pioneerof The Nile.

The true scale of Scat Daddy's loss only became apparent after he, too, dropped dead out of the blue. If that process has since culminated in Justify, then how bitter now to reflect that a graduate of Pioneerof The Nile's second crop, in slaking a 37-year thirst for a Triple Crown winner, had appeared as sensational a kick-start as any young stallion had enjoyed in a generation.

But at least Pioneerof The Nile made hay while the sun shone. Bold Reasoning had not yet had a runner when he died, leaving all his eggs crammed into the basket of Seattle Slew. Luckily, A.P. Indy then came along to salvage the Bold Ruler line. In the case of Pioneerof The Nile, not only is the Fappiano sire-line in flourishing health; even as it stands, at just 13, he has given himself every chance of establishing a lasting branch of his own.

For while American Pharoah will expect the family attorney to read out his name first, when it comes to the reading of the will, he cannot be complacent. Perhaps Cairo Prince, backing up that explosive sales debut with a solid start on the track, will ultimately prove able to reassert the principle of male primogeniture. (He was the pick of Pioneerof The Nile's first crop.) Then there is Classic Empire, whose advent–as his second champion juvenile in four crops–did so much to stifle mutterings that Pioneerof The Nile might be a one-trick pony. These had reflected the fact that their sire had only one other North American graded stakes winner during American Pharoah's sophomore campaign. In fairness, that was Midnight Storm who himself proceeded to earn a very legitimate place at stud.

All these rival claims to the succession, admittedly, are being staked away from the patriarch's farm. Pioneerof The Nile was the only six-figure cover among 22 stallions crowded onto WinStar's roster. Of the four standing at $50,000 or higher, Distorted Humor (Forty Niner) is 26; Tiznow (Cee's Tizzy) and More Than Ready (Southern Halo) are 22; and Speightstown (Gone West) is 21.

The farm does have a bunch of promising young sires, several supported with big books, and maybe one or two will break through to improve the balance. Moreover the WinStar silks are again associated with emerging talent on the track, and you can only keep all those cogs moving together if you take a pragmatic view about, for instance, the decision to cash in Justify to Coolmore. That was an avowed wrench, however, and one that will perhaps compound the grief now being experienced among the WinStar team.

But who knows? The upgrade in his books following American Pharoah, who was conceived at just $17,500, may yet produce further competition for Pioneerof The Nile's legacy. Only last week one of his sons realized $1.2 million at OBS, while his weanlings last year averaged over $600,000. And there would be something nicely symmetrical about bookending his career with another champion or two.

He was, after all, bred from the very first broodmare bought by Zayat Stables. Star Of Goshen (Lord At War {Arg}) herself only died a few weeks ago, aged 24. She had been sought out by Ahmed Zayat after her son Forefathers (Gone West) had been Grade II-placed in his silks, and was purchased carrying a foal by Empire Maker (Unbridled). That, of course, turned out to be Pioneerof The Nile.

Star Of Goshen's genetic contribution should not be neglected. She was by a splendid and underrated influence, not least as a broodmare sire–in which capacity Lord At War also gave us GI Breeders' Cup Classic winner Raven's Pass (Elusive Quality) and GI Kentucky Derby winner War Emblem (Our Emblem). And she was a wildly talented runner herself, storming home by 11 lengths in the La Troienne S.–incidentally beating a subsequent Grade I winner in Hennessy (Storm Cat)'s half-sister Pearl City (Carson City)–before sadly derailing.

But it will doubtless be as a conduit for her son's sire-line that people will continue to seek “the source of the Nile.” Curiously, it has been cursed by wretched longevity. Fappiano died at 13, Unbridled at 14. Happily Empire Maker himself continues to ply his trade at 19, having been young enough to be repatriated after his grandson (by a graduate of only his second crop) won the Triple Crown.

Both by their own deeds and those of their stock, this has become much the most Classic-flavored of Mr. Prospector lines, and is founded in a Nerud family seeded by epochal influences. Empire Maker, moreover, brought into play the extraordinary genes of his mother Toussaud.

American Pharoah took his sire-line's record in the Kentucky Derby to 1-2-2-1, famously redressing his sire's contribution to a sequence of three seconds in four runnings for the Zayats. Admittedly Pioneerof The Nile broke his maiden on turf at Saratoga and won two synthetic Grade Is as a juvenile, so may yet diversify his legacy. But his size and length and immense timber were ideally adapted to two turns of dirt.

How very sad, that those great bones should have to be laid to rest already. But there is no need for the kind of embalmment that consoled the pharaohs, for the name of Pioneerof The Nile to endure on the Turf–not just in our grateful memories, but in the deeds of his sons; and soon, with luck, those of his grandsons.