Since joining the Kentucky Derby Museum, Chris Goodlett has walked around Churchill Downs many times and heard admiring fans say to each other, “Oh, look at that beautiful gray horse.”
Not many of those remarks have come while looking at the winner’s circle after the Derby.
Essential Quality is expected to be the first gray horse to go off as the Kentucky Derby favorite in 25 years. A gray horse hasn’t won the Derby since Giacomo in 2005, and only eight grays have won it since 1930.
According to historians and experts, there are fewer gray horses than more traditional chestnut, bay, brown, and black horses, and therefore fewer chances to win the sport’s biggest race.
“That genetic determinant of the gray color is just not at a high enough frequency in the thoroughbred population,” said Dr. James MacLeod, professor of veterinary science at the University of Kentucky’s Gluck Equine Research Center. “There’s no functional connection between the single-gene determinant of gray coat color and the genes associated with elite athletic performance in thoroughbred racehorses.”
Gray does belong in the spectrum of colors for elite racehorses over the past century, especially in recent decades. Silver Charm won the first two legs of the Triple Crown in 1997 before falling short in the Belmont, and Winning Colors in 1988 remains the most recent filly to win the Derby.
Success has been rare, with 110 grays running in the Derby over the past 90 years and 7.3% winning. Goodlett can’t say how that compares to horses of other colors, which have won the different 82 most recent incarnations of the race.
“There’s not a lot of gray stallions and not a lot of gray mares,” National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame communications director Brien Bouyea said. “A lot of the traditional breeding, I don’t think anybody has anything against gray horses when it comes to breeding. There just haven’t been a lot of stallions out there that have carried that genetic along.”
Essential Quality could be on the leading edge of the next generation of speedy grays thanks to his sire, Tapit, who has fathered some strong horses and is is expected to produce more. Fellow Derby runner Soup and Sandwich also have Tapit lineage on his mother’s side.top tier on average than a normal year so we might see an increase in grays at the top tier over the next couple of decades.” Grays could be even more prominent on the Triple Crown circuit in the coming years had it not been for the death of North American all-time money-earner Arrogate last June at age 7. A 2-year-old filly sired by Arrogate recently sold for $1 million, and Bouyea said some in the industry are eager to buy more of the champion horse’s babies based on pedigree.
