The Thanksgiving weekend saw two juvenile stakes that have gained added significance with their important point-earning role in the “Road to the Kentucky Derby.” The Remsen Stakes and Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes (both gr. II) turned out to be fiercely-contested affairs, with Overanalyze taking the Remsen by a nose at Aqueduct Racetrack and Uncaptured getting the better of Frac Daddy by a neck at Churchill Downs.
Coincidentally, Uncaptured (reviewed here last month) and Overanalyze have already crossed swords, Overanalyze staying on to finish third, eight lengths behind the triumphant Uncaptured, in the Iroquois Stakes (gr. III). The Remsen marks the second time that Overanalyze has rebounded from a graded stakes defeat to win a similar event. Successful over five furlongs at Saratoga on his debut, he then faded to fourth, seven lengths behind Shanghai Bobby in the Three Chimneys Hopeful Stakes (gr. II) after battling for the lead in the early stages. Returning in the Futurity Stakes (gr. II), Overanalyze gained his first stakes triumph, closing from off the pace to score by 3 1/4 lengths.
Victories at five and six furlongs and defeats at seven and eight furlongs naturally raised some questions about Overanalyze’s distance capacity. Those concerns were, to a degree, dispelled by his determined triumph over the Remsen’s nine furlongs.
It’s interesting to note that Overanalyze is a son of the late Dixie Union, who in mid-autumn last year was represented by another top juvenile whose stamina couldn’t be taken for granted. Of course, that horse, Union Rags , went on to take the Belmont Stakes (gr. I) at 1 1/2 miles. Dixie Union himself was a graded winner over six, 6 1/2, and eight furlongs at 2. At 3, he managed to stretch out to nine furlongs to capture the Haskell Invitational (gr. I) over Captain Steve, Milwaukee Brew , and More Than Ready . But after finishing fourth over the 10 furlongs of the Travers Stakes (gr. I), Dixie Union dropped back to seven furlongs to take the Malibu Stakes (gr. I).
As a stallion, his influence has tended toward the speedier end of the spectrum, although in addition to Union Rag’s Belmont victory, Dixie Union offspring Gone Astray , Justwhistledixie, and Dixie City are graded winners at nine furlongs. Another son, Grasshopper , ran Street Sense to a half-length in the Travers.
Overanalyze’s dam, the unraced Unacloud, has made four trips through the sales ring, selling three times: for $14,000 as a weanling, $17,500 as a yearling, and finally when acquired by Overanalyze’s breeder, Diamond A Farm, for $400,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky November sale in 2006 (having been a $17,000 RNA when first offered as a broodmare five years earlier).
This appreciation in value is explained by the fact that Unacloud’s third foal, the Meadowlake filly Meadow Breeze, had captured that year’s Matron Stakes (gr. I). The mare’s two offspring foaled after Meadow Breeze and before Unacloud’s sale—a Kafwain filly who was unplaced on her only start, and the one-time winner Good Measure (a gelding by Maria’s Mon)—did little to enhance her value, nor did the foal that she was carrying when she changed hands, the unraced Teton Forest filly Cloudy Forest.
Unacloud’s first formatting under Diamond A ownership produced the filly Under Wraps, a 2008 sister to Overanalyze who scored a sole victory in a maiden claiming race over six furlongs at Golden Gate Fields. Between Under Wraps and her graded-winning sibling, Unacloud produced the Forestry gelding Might Monsoon, a two-time winner who has placed in four stakes events, including a third in the Best Pal Stakes (gr. II) last year. Unacloud is also dam of a yearling filly by Elusive Quality , and after being barren to Mineshaft , was bred to Tiznow for a 2013 foal.
Unacloud is by the Private Account stallion Unaccounted For, winner of the Jim Dandy Stakes (gr. II) and Whitney Handicap (gr. I), and subsequently a leading sire in Turkey. Unacloud is a half sister to the Matron Stakes (gr. I) third Illusoria (dam of the stakes-winning and graded-placed Peak Maria’s Way). Overanalyze’s granddam, the Two Punch daughter Cloud’s Ambre, is a half sister to Irish Cloud and Stormy Cloud, both stakes winners in Maryland-bred competition. Cloud’s Ambre is out of Arctic Cloud—by Yukon, a Northern Dancer half brother to Mr. Prospector—a prolific stakes winner in the Northeast, taking six black-type events at Pimlico Race Course, Monmouth Park, Garden State, and Penn National Race Course, and also earning graded black type with thirds in the Black-Eyed Susan Stakes (gr. II) and Anne Arundel Handicap (gr. III). The family, which, in direct female line previously had not yielded a top performer for several generations, goes back to Muzzie II, an English bred daughter of Pharos imported by Joseph Widener in the 1930s.
Rated A+ by TrueNicks based on the cross of Northern Dancer-line stallions over daughters of Unaccounted For, Overanalyze also can be analyzed as a product of the Dixieland Band/Private Account cross (again, TrueNicks-rated A+) that produced Italian Oaks (Ity-I) victress Menhoubah, who was one of three stakes winners from nine starters on the direct mating of Dixieland Band with mares by Private Account. The broad cross of Dixieland Band and sons over mares by Private Account and his sons has returned six stakes winners from 50 starters. Overanalyze also has two crosses of Northern Dancer, two of Mr. Prospector, and an extra cross of that horse’s dam, Gold Digger. With a gritty juvenile victory over nine furlongs already accomplished, it’s likely that, should he prove good enough, lack of stamina won’t prevent Overanalyze from crediting his sire with a second posthumous classic winner.
