Making the Grade: El Kabeir

El Kabeir (inside) held off Imperia to win the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes. (Photo by Churchill Downs/Reed Palmer)
Making the Grade, which will run through the 2015 Belmont Stakes, focuses on the winners of the big races, usually from the previous weekend, who could impact the next Triple Crown. We’ll be taking a close look at impressive winners and evaluating their chances to win important races based upon ability, running style, connections (owner, trainer, jockey) and pedigree. 
This week we take a closer look at El Kabeir, winner of the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes on Nov. 29 at Churchill Downs. 

El Kabeir looked like a potential star after winning his second career start by 10 ¾ lengths in August at Saratoga Race Course. After failing twice in graded stakes, the Scat Daddy colt earned a breakthrough victory in the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes. Let’s take a look at how this horse profiles as a potential player on the Kentucky Derby trail.

El Kabeir
Gray or Roan Colt
Sire (Father): Scat Daddy
Dam (Mother): Great Venue, by Unbridled’s Song
Owners: Zayat Stables
Breeder: Rustlewood Farm (Fl.)
Trainer: John P. Terranova II

Ability: Jeff Seder’s and Patti Miller’s EQB Inc. picked El Kabeir out of the 2013 OBS August sale of selected yearlings for $250,000 on behalf of current owner Zayat Stables. He has already earned more on the racetrack ($268,892) in five starts than his auction price.
El Kabeir finished third after a troubled start in his debut before the aforementioned, eye-opening maiden win on Aug. 30 at Saratoga Race Course, where he set the pace and overwhelmed the opposition in a runaway victory at 7 furlongs. He earned a 107 Equibase Speed Figure for that performance.
El Kabeir subsequently did not fire on a sloppy track in the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes at Belmont Park in his stakes debut, but he rebounded to finish second in the Grade 2 Nashua Stakes on a muddy track at Aqueduct. He earned an 81 Equibase Speed Figure for the Champagne and a 91 for the Nashua.
In the 1 1/16-mile Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes, El Kabeir set the pace and narrowly held off fast-finishing runner-up Imperia to win by a head. His 94 Equibase Speed Figure was a nice progression from his previous two races, both at a mile, but did not come close to threatening the career-best figure he earned for his maiden win.
That 107 speed figure puts El Kabeir near the best of the 2-year-old division. Daredevil earned a 110 in winning the Champagne and probable Eclipse Award finalists Texas Red and American Pharoah, another promising 2-year-old owned by Zayat Stables, both have earned a 106 in stakes competition.
I’d like to see El Kabeir back in triple digits in a race around two turns before I put him in the same class as American Pharoah or Breeders’ Cup Juvenile victor Texas Red.
Running style: Perhaps the biggest concern for me about El Kabeir is whether or not he needs the lead to run his “A” race. So far, he’s been out in front for his three best starts: his two victories and the Nashua runner-up finish.
It’s tough to be a need-the-lead type and win the 1 ¼-mile Kentucky Derby, especially considering El Kabeir did not finish very fast in the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes — :06.82 for the final sixteenth of a mile and :32.34 for the last five-sixteenths of a mile. He has plenty of early speed. If he can harness that speed while rating just off the pace, El Kabeir would give his jockey options as the races get longer on the Triple Crown trail. That versatility is a powerful trait that allows a rider to zip right to the front if the tempo is slow or drop back just a bit if the pace is especially hot.

Previous Making the Grades
Competitive Edge
American Pharoah
Carpe Diem
Daredevil
Texas Red
Ocho Ocho Ocho

Connections: Zayat Stables is the racing operation of businessman Ahmed Zayat and his family. Zayat, an entrepreneur who has found success turning around struggling companies, got into the Thoroughbred business in 2005 and ranked among the top five owners by U.S. earning every year from 2007 through 2011, leading all owners by purse earnings in 2008.
Zayat, who developed the Al Ahram Beverages Co. into the largest bottler and distributor in the Middle East and later sold it to Heineken International, has been knocking on the door in U.S. Triple Crown races in recent years. He finished second in the 2012 Kentucky Derby and Preakness with Bodemeister and second that year in the Belmont Stakes with Paynter. Zayat Stables also was second in the 2011 Kentucky Derby with Nehro and second in the 2009 Derby with Pioneerof the Nile.
Trainer John P. Terranova II counts Grade 1 winners Laragh, Negligee, Franny Freud and Lilacs and Lace among his top runners. He has trained 52 stakes winners and 14 graded stakes winners since he took out his trainer’s license in 1992. Terranova’s only Kentucky Derby starter was Falling Sky, who was unplaced in 2013.
Calvin Borel rode El Kabeir in the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes. Borel won the Kentucky Derby in 2007 with Street Sense as well as in 2009 with Mine That Bird and 2010 aboard Super Saver. He also won the 2009 Preakness Stakes on eventual Horse of the Year Rachel Alexandra. In his three previous races before the Kentucky Jockey Club, El Kabeir was ridden by top New York-based jockey Irad Ortiz Jr., who finished 14th in his first Kentucky Derby with Uncle Sigh in 2014.
EL KABEIR AND CALVIN BOREL AFTER WINNING THE KENTUCKY JOCKEY CLUB

Photo by Eclipse Sportswire
Pedigree: El Kabeir is from the fourth crop of 2007 Florida Derby victor Scat Daddy, whose top runners to date include multiple Grade 1 winner Lady of Shamrock; French Group 1 winner No Nay Never, runner-up in this year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint; 2012 Pennsylvania Derby victor Handsome Mike; 2012 Sunland Derby winner Daddy Nose Best; and multiple group/graded stakes winners Frac Daddy and Daddy Long Legs.
Scat Daddy has sired 25 group or graded stakes winners and 35 stakes winners from his four crops. He has 241 winners from 348 starters that have earned more than $20-million, and Scat Daddy has proven capable of siring horses with the talent to make some noise on the Triple Crown trail.
El Kabeir is the first starter produced by the unraced Unbridled’s Song mare Great Venue, who is a half-sister (same dam, different sire) to multiple graded stakes-winning sprinter Too Much Bling as well as stakes winners Ready for Roses and Barnsy, the former a stakes winner at 1 ¼ miles and the latter a stakes winner at 1 1/8 miles. Another half-sibling to Great Venue is stakes-winning sprinter Littlebitabling, who twice finished second in stakes at 1 1/16 miles.
El Kabeir’s grandam (maternal grandmother), Rose Colored Lady, was a stakes-winning sprinter and a full sister (same dam, same sire) to Forest Picnic, a stakes winner at 1 1/8 miles.
There also is some back class in this family as French champion Baiser Vole and French highweight Squill appear under El Kabeir’s fifth dam. This family also is responsible for Set Them Free, the dam of 2005 Kentucky Derby winner Giacomo and Grade 1 winner Tiago.