Giant’s Causeway as a sire of sires; broodmare sire of a sire; and a broodmare sire
Son Not This Time and grandson Gun Runner topped headlines over the weekend
By Frances J. Karon
A year ago this week, we posted “Giant’s Causeway sons are the weekend stars” in this space, noting that despite some of the stallion’s N. American-based sons siring Grade 1 winners through the years, his male line in N. America had been struggling until Not This Time appeared on the scene, all the while the European branches were flourishing:
With the breakout success of Not This Time, it’s been nice to see Giant’s Causeway have a resurgence in N. America. For many years, his European-based sons, with Darley’s Shamardal at the forefront, far overshadowed the U.S. line, despite Eskendereya getting champion sprinter Mitole (last year’s leading first-crop sire in N. America) and Grade 1 winner Mor Spirit; First Samurai getting Grade 1 winners Executiveprivilege, Justin Phillip, and Lea (First Samurai stands for $7,500…are you paying attention, home breeders?); Protonico siring the (disqualified) Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit; and Brody’s Cause, Creative Cause, Fed Biz, and Red Giant each getting a Northern Hemisphere Grade 1 winner of their own.
And here we are, almost a year to the day after that post, writing about a weekend Giant’s Causeway trifecta: as a sire of sires, a broodmare sire of a sire, and a broodmare sire.
Sire of sires
The lightly raced graded winner Not This Time wasn’t one of the 36 Grade 1 winners sired by Giant’s Causeway, but regardless, he’s his sire’s flag bearer on this side of the pond and was represented by two first-time stakes winners on Saturday, both of them graded. Magnitude in particular was the talk of social media after his 9 3/4-length win in the G2 Risen Star S. at Fair Grounds, in a stakes record time of 1:48.85, for owner Winchell Thoroughbreds LLC and trainer Steve Asmussen that earned him a 108 Beyer.
As Yogi Berra would say, that Winchell and Asmussen have a top colt by Not This Time leading into the Classic season is a case of “déjà vu all over again,” right down to the earthquake-themed name, three years after the same connections campaigned Not This Time’s son Epicenter, who won the 2022 Risen Star in the then-stakes record time bested by Magnitude.
Magnitude still has big shoes to fill, as Epicenter went on to win the G2 Louisiana Derby and run second in both the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, and, later, he won the G1 Travers and was named champion 3-year-old male, but it’s no surprise that in the aftermath of Epicenter, Winchell went back to the Not This Time well to buy Magnitude as a yearling. Although Magnitude has been slower to come to hand than Epicenter—he was 43-1 in the Risen Star—he’s here now, and if he reproduces anything close to his Risen Star form down the line, he’ll be a major force among 3-year-olds this year. He’s the only winner from four foals of racing age, not counting a 2-year-old colt by McKinzie, out of unplaced Rockadelic (Bernardini), a daughter of Grade 1 winner Octave (Unbridled’s Song).
MAGNITUDE (2022 Not This Time – Rockadelic, by Bernardini)
B: Ron Stolich
O: Winchell Thoroughbreds LLC
T: Steve Asmussen
Record: 7-3-1-0, $446,165
Highest achievement: Grade 2 winner
Last Auction Price: $450,000 at Keeneland September
Note that Winchell bought a yearling by Not This Time last year too, a colt out of the Uncle Mo mare Mo’s Love, and as far as we can tell, he’s only the third Not This Time yearling Winchell has ever purchased. Is it too soon to expect that colt, who’s still unnamed (but who, we’re guessing, will have an earthquake-themed name), to put on a show in the Fair Grounds Classic preps in 2026?
We can gauge the much-heralded rising popularity of Not This Time, who stands at Taylor Made Farm for $175,000, by the prices Winchell paid for each of their colts: Epicenter ($260,000 in 2020); Magnitude ($450,000 in 2023); and ’23 Mo’s Love ($625,000 in 2024). By the way, the third dam of the Mo’s Love colt is Goldspell, a full sister to Trolley Song (by Caro out of Lucky Spell); Trolley Song was the dam of Unbridled’s Song, sire of the second dam of Magnitude.
Magnitude is one of two sons of Not This Time in the top 10 on the Kentucky Derby points leaderboard; Juddmonte’s Brad Cox trainee Disco Time, winner of the G3 Lecomte last month at Fair Grounds, currently sits in ninth place. Both colts are bred on the same cross, with dams by sons of A.P. Indy—Bernardini (Magnitude) and Jump Start (Disco Time). The Not This Time/A.P. Indy cross has also produced Grade 1 winner Sibelius and Grade 2 winner Arzak.
Broodmare sire and broodmare sire of sires
Magnitude’s only stakes line prior to the Risen Star was a distant second last December in the listed Gun Runner S., the race named after Winchell’s Horse of the Year—a race Winchell and Asmussen won with Epicenter in 2021.
Gun Runner (Candy Ride) is now a leading sire based at Three Chimneys, and he was represented on Saturday by his 27th graded stakes winner from his first four crops (excluding his current 2-year-olds) when the Coolmore partners’ Hall of Fame, a $1.4 million yearling trained by…who else…Steve Asmussen (a Hall of Famer, like Gun Runner), won the G3 Mineshaft, also at Fair Grounds. The Mineshaft was 4-year-old Hall of Fame’s first career stakes win.
HALL OF FAME (2021 Gun Runner – Flag Day, by Giant’s Causeway)
B: Earle I. Mack LLC
O: Mrs. John Magnier, Michael B. Tabor, Derrick Smith, Westerberg, Gandharvi LLC, and Brook T. Smith
T: Steve Asmussen
Record: 7-4-1-0, $322,960
Highest achievement: Grade 3 winner
Last Auction Price: $1,400,000 yearling at Fasig-Tipton Saratoga
As my colleague Sid Fernando noted in this space yesterday, Giant’s Causeway is the broodmare sire of Hall of Fame—whose dam is the unraced Giant’s Causeway mare Flag Day—as well as the broodmare sire of Gun Runner, so Hall of Fame is inbred 3x2 to Giant’s Causeway. And he’s not even the first graded stakes winner by Gun Runner bred on the “inbreeding to the broodmare sire of the sire” pattern: Hall of Fame was preceded by Gunite, a colt from Gun Runner’s first crop who won the Grade 1 Hopeful as a 2-year-old in 2021 and the Grade 1 Forego in 2023. Gunite’s dam is the minor stakes winner Simple Surprise, a daughter of Giant’s Causeway’s son Cowboy Cal (a Grade 2 winner who sired only one N. American graded stakes winner among his 12 black-type winners), so Gunite, a Winchell homebred trained by Steve Asmussen, is inbred 3x3 to Giant’s Causeway.
Epicenter and Gunite both stand at Coolmore America; Epicenter has his first yearlings this year, and Gunite will be having his first foals, looking to further cement the Giant’s Causeway sireline in N. America.
Looking ahead, it’s easy to speculate that Gun Runner and Not This Time, two of the best young active N. American stallions, may have a fruitful relationship in either direction for years and even generations to come: Gun Runner as a sire with daughters of Not This Time (for 3x3 inbreeding to Giant’s Causeway on that “broodmare sire of the sire” pattern); and Not This Time as a sire with Gun Runner mares, as Not This Time is already the sire of champion Epicenter and Grade 2 winner Simplification from daughters of Gun Runner’s sire Candy Ride.
Odds and ends: We mentioned above that Not This Time was represented by a second graded stakes winner over the weekend, and that was Dazzling Move in the Grade 3 Royal Delta at Gulfstream. Dazzling Move’s dam is by Saint Liam, a Horse of the Year half-brother to Giant’s Causeway’s dam Quiet Giant, a Grade 2 winner. Not This Time’s other good horse bred on the Saint Ballado cross is Grade 1 sprinter Cogburn, a new stallion at WinStar in 2025…Gun Runner also had another new stakes winner on Saturday when 3-year-old daughter Runnin N Gunnin led home a Gun Runner/Steve Asmussen exacta with Enchanting in the Sunland Park Oaks. Along with Running Away, Runnin N Gunnin is one of two Gun Runner fillies in the top 10 on the Kentucky Oaks points leaderboard…
