OASIS DREAM BY ANDREW CAULFIELD
When a champion two-year-old takes high rank as a first-crop stallion and then sires a record number of 38 individual two-year-old winners in his second crop, it would seem fair to assume that precocity is his progeny’s main asset. But such an assumption would be wrong when the stallion in question is OASIS DREAM.
OASIS DREAM stands under 16 hands, as does his sire Green Desert, and their medium size inevitably raised questions about whether they would be equally effective at three as they had been at two. Green Desert responded by raising his Timeform rating from 118 at two to 127 at three and OASIS DREAM did even better, boosting his rating from 122 at two to 129 at three. In the process this record-breaking winner of the Middle Park Stakes established himself as Europe’s champion sprinter, thanks to further Gr.1 victories in the July Cup and Nunthorpe Stakes.
Now many of his progeny are showing that they too are fully effective after the age of two. Whereas there were 22 juvenile winners in his 2005 crop, 43 members of this crop went on to score at three and 12 have already won at four. Among these winners are the very talented four-year-old fillies Visit and Tuscan Evening, both of whom are scheduled to contest the Gr.1 Gamely Stakes on May 30.
OASIS DREAM'S second crop is also producing plenty of three-year-old winners, with 21 winning before the end of May, including the stakes winners Midday and Alta Fedelta. The chances are that the three-year-olds from this crop are eventually also going to overtake its highly impressive number of juvenile winners.
Date:
28 May 2009