CLASSIC FAMILIES – HARNESS RACING DATABASE GEM
Have you ever wondered who the first dual winner of the Ashburton Trotting Cup was …who the foundation mare was for your Group winning filly … who held the NZ pacing mile records at the turn of the century ….. which track hosted the inaugural Westport Cup ….. what stallion would cross best with your mare and so much more. Then look no further than Classic Families (CF).
The brainchild of Perth, Western Australia based Ron Groves who developed it in the early 2000’s, Classic Families is a worldwide standardbred pedigree database. Classic Families was originally produced annually on CD and available only to a paying audience. Since December 2008 Classic Families has been available, instantly updated, free on line through the website www.classicfamilies.net. Classic Families is co-hosted by leading stallion and breeding farms in Australia, Nevele R Stud (New Zealand) and Blue Chip Farms (United States).
The Classic Families team, for all or the major part of the past ten years, with their areas of responsibility, consists of : Ron Groves, (North America); John Peck, Melbourne (Australia and Europe); Peter Craig, Christchurch (New Zealand) and an excellent programmer Simon Morris (Gold Coast). Biographies can be found under the Help/About page. The team could not have produced the extensive database of information contained in CF without the support of many individuals, club administrators, libraries and national associations worldwide especially Harness Racing Australia and Harness Racing New Zealand.
Classic Families worldwide audience, sees major users of the database come from Australia (approx. 50%), North America (15%), New Zealand (11%) with the balance from the greater European area. Among the more obscure nations where usage was recorded were Turkey, Iraq and Azerbaijan.
The CF database currently contains :
details of 168,000+ horses
over 6,200 maternal families
results of 4,000+ individual races (622 NZ; 1,471 Australia; just under 1,200 North America; 650+ Europe; 89 UK)
close to 115,000 race results
373 lists of award winners, money and speed honours
details of dates of operation/sizes of 675 tracks worldwide, some with brief history
The HELP PAGE to assist users is a guide to Classic Families information sources – http://classicfamilies.net/
Horse Info
Contains the base details of a horses sex, date and country of birth, stakes, best mile time/rate, 4 generation pedigree and Classic Family number (by clicking on any horse in the pedigree it becomes the horse under review) . Tail lines : provide the sire and maternal lines traced back to their original source. Descendants : gives both male and female Classic winners applicable to family members. The offspring tab : lists progeny in the database applicable to horse under review. Classic Crosses : allows you to check every classic winner and their wins of the horse as a sire or dam sire. History provides a listing of a horses’ feature race wins, national awards, speed records and siring/broodmare siring credits. A printable 6 generation pedigree that allows you to check for duplicates and cross duplicates. Check out Christen Me’s history by clicking on http://classicfamilies.net/CF/History.aspx?HorseID=10156213
Family Winners
Using a family number or family name allows you to get a complete list, in reverse chronological order, of all Classic Winners and Classic List horses in the family
Classic Races
Results of 4,000+ races past and present worldwide – being added to regularly (currently 622 individual NZ races on the database)
Elite Performers
a) performers – all time lists for $500,000+ earners in ANZ; millionaire Pacers and Trotters; time categories/performances including separate ANZ listings; Hall of Famers
b) awards – Horse of the Year Awards (Australia, NZ, Canada, USA plus some European); Sire of the Year (numerous countries – lots of age categories for ANZ & US); Broodmare Sire of the Year; Grand Circuit champions
c) historical – lists of the first 100 $100,000 winners; 2:10 winners; 2:05 winners; 1:55 winners for Australia, NZ & North America; 1:50 winners.
d) speed – Mile evolution records for several countries/age groups; fastest pacers/trotters of year in NA (2/3yo and overall)
Tracks
Use the tracks tab to select one of the track codes to view the results of all races and/or elite performances run at that track plus compare speed performances across tracks of different sizes. NZ tracks – years of operation are known for all tracks while track sizes are available for all but three used in 1890’s/early 1900’s – Johnsonville and Hutt County TC; Manaia – Waimate Plains TC and A&P Solway Showgrounds, Masterton. An ongoing process to obtain details in respect of worldwide tracks not currently showing years of operation and/or track sizes continues. http://classicfamilies.net/CF/ElitePerformers.aspx?ListID=124
The USER GUIDE (an on line tutorial) contains a detailed run through of how to manoeuvre around the various features of the CF program. To maximise the benefits from using the database, it is well worth an hour’s study to become familiar with the terminology used and options available. For example, the definitions of Classic Races, Classic Winners, Classic Horses, Classic Progeny and Classic Descendants; maternal family and country numbering; time record format; treatment of earnings between countries.
Race success or potential cannot be judged by speed and/or earnings alone – CF allows comparison of pedigrees of horses back to their tap root mare and the relevant maternal families’ successes. Using the Classic Crosses tab and selecting “as sire” produces a sires Classic Winners sorted alphabetically. The same can be done using the “as damsire” tab. These tables allow you to assess what type of stallions or sire/dam sire crosses have been successful with the immediate family. By clicking on the headings, one can sort the information to suit your purposes. There are many other possibilities – the user guide tutorial assists in this regard.
http://classicfamilies.net/CF/ClassicCrosses.aspx?HorseID=10032109
Try Classic Families out soon, it’s free and you will be amazed at the depth of information it contains.
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