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Picture : Gimmethegreenlight, Varsfontein’s record-breaking son of More Than Ready (Supplied).

Gimmethegreenlight was recently crowned champion sire for the second time and it has been discovered that last season he achieved  what no other South African sire had done for at least 53 years and he might possibly have been the first to do it in history.

The Varsfontein-based son of More Than Ready was not only National Champion Sire, but was also the leading sire of three-year-olds and the leading sire of two-year-olds. 

Carl de Vos, stud manager of Varsfontein Stud where Gimmethegreenlight stands, said, “Charles Faull looked through the records, which go back 53 years, and said Gimmethegreenlight is the only stallion to have won all three of those titles in the same season.”
 
Gimmethegreenlight, despite it possibly being a first, achieved this remarkable feat with ease as he was well clear in all three categories.
 
The championships are decided on the stakes accumulated by the progeny of the sire.
 
However, Gimmethegreenlight also had the most winners in all three categories as well as the most stakes winners in all three categories.   
 
Gimmethegreenlight was about R5.3 million clear of second-placed What A Winter in the national sires championship with his progeny having accumulated stakes of R23,030,650 compared to What A Winter’s R17,331,563.
 
He had 109 winners of 160 races and a winners to runners percentage of 48.2%.
 
The second most number of winners was the 102 of What A Winter. 
 
Gimmethegreenlight had 14 stakes winners of 21 races.  
 
Of those, four were Gr 1 winners.
 
Gimme A Prince won two Gr 1 races, Bless My Stars won one Gr 1 race, Lucky Lad won one Gr 1 race and Sandringham Summit won one Gr 1 race.
 
Second on the log for stakes winners was the 13 individual stakes winners of 15 races of the late Dynasty (who produced two Gr 1 winners of four races, Make It Snappy and Desert Miracle both winning two Gr 1s). 
 
Trippi equaled Gimmethegreenlight in the Gr 1 wins statistic. He also had four individual Gr 1 winners of five races (Charles Dickens winning two Gr 1s and Jet Dark, Trip Of Fortune and Winchester Mansion each winning one).  
 
Gimmeagreenlight was a dominating R3,681,388 clear of Varsfontein colleague Master Of My Fate on the three-year-old log with his progeny accumulating R10,358,588 compared to the latter’s R6,677,200.
 
He had 50 three-year-old winners of 75 races and had a fine winners to runners percentage in the three-year-old category of 62.5%.
 
He had five individual three-year-old stakes winners of six races.
The second most individual three-year-old winners was the 47 produced by both Master Of My Fate and William Longsword.
 
The sires who produced the second most individual stakes-winning three-year-olds were Dynasty and his son Futura with four apiece and the latter’s progeny matched Gimmethegreenlight in number of stakes wins on six. 
  
Gimmethegreenlight was also dominant on the two-year-old log  with the stakes earnings accumulated by his progeny of R4,428,925 being R1,566,762 clear of the R2,862,163 of What A Winter.
 
He had 21 individual two-year-old winners of 30 races as opposed to the 19 individual winners of 23 races of the champion freshman sire, the late Lancaster Bomber. 
 
Gimmethegreenlight had four individual two-year-old stakes winners of seven races as opposed to the three individual two-year-old stakes winners of three races of Quearari.
 
All in all it was a dominant season by the stallion with the movie star looks.