{"id":60032,"date":"2022-10-28T13:58:39","date_gmt":"2022-10-28T13:58:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/?p=60032"},"modified":"2022-10-28T13:58:41","modified_gmt":"2022-10-28T13:58:41","slug":"is-constitution-sitting-on-another-upgrade-or-is-honor-code-pegged-too-high","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/?p=60032","title":{"rendered":"Is Constitution Sitting on Another Upgrade? Or Is Honor Code Pegged Too High?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Or Both? And Will Constitution Wind Up a Better Sire than American Pharoah?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Currently in the Sim rating system in the sire search function, Constitution sits 35th on the list (Kentucky based, excluding (probably accurately) deceased\/retired sires) and Honor Code clocks in 13th, just between Street Sense and Quality Road. A look at the real life results of these sires might lead one to believe that the expected results should be the opposite of what has happened in the Sim, and signs point to a continued improvement for Constitution in the land of actual flesh and blood horses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently in the Sim rating system in the sire search function, Constitution sits 35th on the list (Kentucky based, excluding (probably accurately) deceased\/retired sires) and Honor Code clocks in 13th, just between Street Sense and Quality Road. A look at the real life results of these sires might lead one to believe that the expected results should be the opposite of what has happened in the Sim, and signs point to a continued improvement for Constitution in the land of actual flesh and blood horses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently, Honor Code has 146 winners from 282 starters while Constitution has notched 202 winners from 272 starters. As far as black-type winners go, Honor Code has 11 (five graded) and Constitution has 29 (15 graded). The latter helping to explain a $13.5 million gap in cumulative lifetime earnings between the pair, with Constitution nearly doubling Honor Code in short order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sim is another matter. Honor Code has an 81% winner’s rate (from 878 runners), with 9.2% of his foals winning a stakes race and 2.9% passing the graded stakes test. Constitution, meanwhile, hold on let me scroll down the page that’s ranked in descending order, scrolling, scrolling, has a similar 80% strike rate from 833 runners, but just a 6.1% stakes winner percentage and 1.4% graded stakes winners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now Constitution did get an upgrade for 2020 and his percentages all popped for that crop year, 11.9% stakes winners from that crop, 3.3% graded, which seems nice, but is only in line with what Honor Code has achieved in 2019 and 2020 (12%\/5.3% and 10%\/3.6%).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also these stallions’ stud fees have not remained static through the years, nor since Constitution’s Sim upgrade in 2020. Honor Code was down to $30k in 2020 and was dropped to $20k the following year where he remains. Constitution, was cut to $15k in 2019, was then raised to $40k in 2020 before a big jump to $85k in 2021. Recently WinStar announced a further increase for the 2023 breeding season with the Florida Derby (gr. 1) and Donn Handicap (gr. I) winner going to $110k, the highest at the farm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Again, all this is not happening in a bubble and the past does not mean Constitution will sustain or increase his advantage over Honor Code and his fellow fourth-crop sires. However, there are signs pointing to just that happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I refer you back to the upward arc of Constitution’s stud fees as exhibit A. Exhibit B: Constitution has a Comparable Index (CI) of 1.59 and Honor Code 2.06, but Constitution has been able to improve his mares as judged by his average earnings index (AEI) of 2.00 (Honor Code’s AEI sits at just 1.19. Pharoah’s CI is a high 2.55 but his AEI is just 1.42. Exhibit C: Better mares are being sent Constitution’s way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“He didn’t start out with the highest quality mares and he threw some average-looking horses, but they were athletes that ran great. Now he is getting better mares and his physicals are getting better and better,” Frank Taylor of Taylor Made Sales Agency recently told The Blood-Horse<\/em>. “We’ve seen this happen with a number of top sires like Saint Ballado, Distorted Humor, and with Into Mischief, who started out with no opportunity and became a top sire. Constitution fits that mold and now his pipeline is fully loaded with great horses.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exhibit D: WinStar’s Elliot Walden thinks so (of course he might have a bit of a bias for his stallion), telling The Blood-Horse<\/em>: “The elite stallions keep the quality and level of performance up no matter what. It takes that second cycle after they’ve proven themselves and you see the mare quality climb to a point where they are attractive in the sales ring as well. That is what we are seeing with Constitution now. This is hopefully a break out year for him that will just continue and continue.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though I say they should upgrade Constitution, well, you know, all speculations on how the Sim rates sires need to be accompanied by the reminder that the Sim may have these stallions ranked just right but users may be using them all wrong, or not enough, or too much, or that element of luck just hasn’t hit right. But if I’m to use one of these real life fourth-crop sires I’d be leaning to Constitution (though I like Liam’s Map too). If the upgrade doesn’t come for 2023, I’d still feel happy feeling fairly certain the sire would be upgraded again before the foals I breed next year retire to the breeding shed, and their performance there should be enhanced.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Or Both? And Will Constitution Wind Up a Better Sire than American Pharoah? Currently in the Sim rating system in<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":85,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-previews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/85"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=60032"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60033,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60032\/revisions\/60033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=60032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}