With Kentucky Derby prep race after prep race crashing into our heads, this is an excellent week to take a stock of this year’s prospects while awaiting this weekend's Florida Derby and the next round of major preps (Santa Anita Derby, Wood Memorial, Illinois Derby) on April 9.

It is clear that this is a wide-open division. Most of the top contenders to this point have shown the customary blazing early-speed but none jump off the page as slam-dunk favorites.

So while the majority of analysts will be dissecting pace and speed figures to try and make sense of this year’s hopefuls, perhaps we would be best served by highlighting a subject about as sexy as Janet Reno — breeding.

Of his Derby Dozen (12 leading contenders) thought of by fine turf writer Steve Haskin of The Blood-Horse magazine, an incredible seven of them  (Sun King, Consolidator, Sweet Catomine, High Fly, Noble Causeway, Wilko, and Survivalist) all trace back to Northern Dancer on their sire or male side. To breeding experts, this would hardly be a shock. After all, the Dancer maybe the most influential sire of champions of our time.

Derby not Native Dancer's strong suit
Despite this genetic dominance, his offspring have not excelled in the Kentucky Derby, relative to his overall success in the sport — Ferdinand, Sea Hero and Charismatic being the exceptions to this trend. In fact, the 1964 Derby winner has been blown away in producing Kentucky Derby winners by a less-celebrated child of the ‘60s — Raise a Native.

Of all the tools of handicapping, this is clearly the most powerful angle in recent Derby history.

In the past 19 years, beginning with Ferdinand’s win in 1986, only three winners trace back to Northern Dancer — yet 11 winners trace back to Raise a Native and 9 of those directly to his sensational son Mr. Prospector.

Here are recent examples:

• 2004 winner Smarty Jones, by Elusive Quality.
• 2003 winner Funny Cide, by Distorted Humor.
• 2002 winner War Emblem, by Our Emblem.

Monarchos broke the pattern in 2001 but the trend was very much in evidence in the preceding years, with Fusaichi Pegasus in 2000, Real Quiet in 1998, Grindstone in 1996, and Thunder Gulch in 1995.

In the past 10 years, in fact, offspring of the Raise a Native-Mr. Prospector combo have won seven times, a truly remarkable feat of breeding dominance in North America’s most hallowed race.           

Who needs tapes of prep races?

Why bother crunching the numbers of the speed figures?

Genetics point to two contenders
It would be more direct to simply find the sons of sons of sons of Mr. Prospector and his dad Raise a Native to find this year’s Derby winner. We find two such colts on Haskin’s Derby Dozen list — Bandini and Rockport Harbor.

Bandini, trained by crackerjack conditioner Todd Pletcher is himself a son of 2000 Derby winner, Fusaichi Pegasus. Twelve times in the history of the race, a Derby winner has sired a subsequent winner, with Grindstone in 1996 (sired by 1990 winner Unbridled) being the most recent example. That pair also traces back to Mr. Prospector-Raise a Native.

Speaking of Unbridled, his son Unbridled’s Song is the sire of the other contender in this breeding line — Rockport Harbor. He has been nagged by foot ailments, but trainer John Servis believes he’ll be fit and ready for the Arkansas Derby on April 16. It was Servis, as you may recall, who campaigned Smarty Jones so brilliantly in the 2004 campaign.

History tells us that Raise a Native only ran four races before a bowed tendon ended his career in the early 1960s and sent him prematurely to the breeding shed. Who knew that in his sixth crop, he would sire a foal out of the mare Gold Digger by the name of Mr. Prospector, a horse whose own career was curtailed by recurring ankle injuries.

It is mysterious how this father and son combination of Raise a Native and Mr. Prospector have been genetically magical in producing champions on the first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs. Should Bandini or Rockport Harbor cross the finish line first this year, the pattern of brilliance will continue once again.