Black Caviar, the 5-year-old Australian sensation, who scored her 21st consecutive win on May 12 in Adelaide, has interesting connections to North American horses, including Crimson Saint, who connects to the late, famed Quarter Horse breeder B.F. Phillips, Jr. and Dash For Cash.

Black Caviar (1999) was sired by Bel Esprit, winner of more than $2 million and one of the best sprinters of his generation in Australia.

Bel Esprit was sired by American-bred Royal Academy (1987), sire of 160 stakes winners and the earners of more than $120 million. Royal Academy, whose best lick on the track was at the mile, died this past February at Coolmore Australia.

Royal Academy was sired by Northern Dancer’s son Nijinsky, a British Triple Crown winner who became leading sire in Great Britain and leading broodmare sire in North America.

Royal Academy’s dam was Kentucky-bred Crimson Satan daughter Crimson Saint (1959), who equaled the four furlong record in :44.80 at Oaklawn Park, and set a track record of :56 flat at Hollywood Park.

Crimson Saint’s greatest claim to fame, however, came as a broodmare. She was in foal to Triple Crown champion Secretariat in January 1976, when she was purchased for $295,000 by prominent Kentucky horseman Tom Gentry. The foal, a filly from Secretariat’s second crop, was stakes winner Terlingua, who would produce Storm Cat, one of the most influential stallions of modern times.

Crimson Saint’s first foal, a chestnut colt named Mr. Crimson Ruler (1975), was also sired by Secretariat, but never raced. Instead, he was purchased as a yearling by B.F. Phillips Jr., the same year that Phillips’ homebred Quarter Horse colt Dash For Cash was named AQHA world champion and champion 3-year-old.

Phillips believed that the proper Thoroughbred bloodlines could improve the performance of Quarter Horse runners. And he had proven his theory with Dash For Cash, whose dam, Find A Buyer, was a Thoroughbred, and whose sire, Rocket Wrangler, was by Rocket Bar, a Thoroughbred son of Three Bars.

Although at first glance Secretariat seemed an unlikely cross for Quarter Horses, his sire, Bold Ruler, was a world champion sprinter at 3.

“You can pick the Bold Rulers out on their conformation,” said the late Arthur B. Hancock, Jr., owner of Claiborne Farm and syndicate owner of Nasrullah, Bold Ruler’s sire (Hancock also imported Princequillo, sire of Secretariat’s dam, Somethingroyal, and syndicated Nijinksy II, sire of Royal Academy). “I see the same musculature as Nasrullah. They all had an extra layer of muscle beside their tail running down to their hocks. It is a good sign when you see it in a Bold Ruler. It means strength and speed.”

As a Quarter Horse breeder, Phillips had noticed the similarity in conformation between Dash For Cash and Secretariat, which was confirmed by the late equine artist Jim Reno, who measured both Secretariat and Dash For Cash for larger-than-life-size bronze sculptures.

There was a pedigree connection between the two stallions, as well, through Imperatrice, who was Secretariat’s second dam (Somethingroyal was her daughter), and the fourth dam of Dash For Cash.

Mr. Crimson Ruler was overshadowed at Phillips Ranch by Dash For Cash and never lived up to expectations as a sire. From 16 Quarter Horse crops (a total of 296 foals), he produced just four stakes winners, and his top money earner was Mr Crimson Bug (LTE $133,045), third in the Rainbow Derby. At the time of the Dash For Cash Futurity Sale in July 1984, Mr. Crimson Ruler had sired just one Thoroughbred winner and no stakes-placed runners.

Two Thoroughbreds racing half-a-world apart this year have toppled modern records for most consecutive wins.

Rapid Redux, a 6-year-old Kentucky-bred gelding, claimed his 22nd consecutive win on February 18 at Maryland’s Laurel Park. The previous record of 19 consecutive wins was shared by 2009 Breeders Cup Classic champion and 2010 Horse of the Year Zenyatta, and New-Mexico-bred stakes winner Peppers Pride, both now retired.

Rapid Redux is just one victory short of the record for consecutive North American wins set by Leviathon in 1801. Although, Puerto Rican racehorse Camarero claimed the world record in 1955, when he won his 55th consecutive race, surpassing the Hungarian mare Kincsem, who retired in 1789 at five, with an unblemished record of 54 wins.

On Saturday, May 12, 5-year-old Australian racing phenomenon Black Caviar scored her 21st consecutive win in the G1 Goodwood at Morphettville Racecourse, in Adelaide. Two weeks previously she had broken the Australian record of 19 consecutive wins held jointly by Desert Gold (1917) and Gloaming (1921).

Black Caviar, 2010/2011 Australian Horse of the Year, is expected to ship to England for her next race, the Diamond Jubilee Stakes on June 23 at Royal Ascot, where Queen Elizabeth will be in attendance. The black daughter of Australian sire Bel Esprit, is owned by a syndicate of Melbourne families and friends and conditioned by prominent Australian trainer Peter Moody.

Rapid Redux, by Pleasantly Perfect and out of a Storm Cat daughter, is trained by David Wells for Robert Cole, Jr., who claimed the $85,000 Keeneland Yearling Sale purchase for $6,250 in October 2010. Rapid Redux, with a career total of 28 wins from 42 starts and $31,609, won all 19 of his races in 2011.

“The achievements of Rapid Redux in 2011 were remarkable…something we won’t soon again see,” said Alex Waldrop, president and CEO of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association (NTRA).

Crystal Lehrmann of Gardendale, Texas, and So Sweet Santana marked 222 to win the Non-Pro title at the 6666 Ranch NCHA Western National Championships in Reno, Nevada, Sunday. The show’s $15,000 Novice Non-Pro champion, Amanda Smith on Whirl N Play, finished second.

Lehrmann was a two-time champion at the show, having won the $5,000 Novice Non-Pro with a 224 on So Sweet Santana earlier in the week.

In addition, Jeremy Lehrmann won the $15,000 Amateur finals on Rey Leo Girl.

Bred by Sharron Oaks Ranch, So Sweet Santana is an 8-year-old son of Short Of Santana, out of So Sweet Pepper, by Nitas Wood.

So Sweet Santana has earned more than $80,000, and carried Lehrmann to the Mercuria NCHA World Series of Cutting Non-Pro finals at the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo earlier this year.

Amanda Smith’s 219 on Whirl N Play, by CD Whirl, earned her the Non-Pro reserve championship.

In the $5,000 Novice Non-Pro, Sammy Nevis on Kitty McCoy 06 and Debbie Day on Scootin With Style, split the reserve championship by marking 219 behind Lehrmann’s 224.

Kitty McCoy 06 is a daughter of WR This Cats Smart which Shad Platt rode to win the $10,000 Novice Title. Scootin With Style is a 7-year-old son of Smart Lil Scoot.

Doug Wiens of Chilliwack, British Columbia, won Sunday’s $50,000 Amateur finals at the 6666 Ranch NCHA Western National Championships in Reno, Nevada. He marked 223 on Trava Bob for a two-point win over Jim Bob Kaufmann on Smart N Pretty.

Wiens bred 9-year-old Trava Bob by Travalena out of PF Docs Med, by Peppys Formula. Wiens and Trava Bob were $15,000 Novice Non-Pro finalists at the NCHA Western National Championships in 2010.

Jim Bob Kaufmann of Clarksburg, California, took the reserve championship with a 221 on Smart N Pretty, a 6-year-old Dulces Smart Lena mare bred by Carol Ward.

I’ll Have Another, an $11,000 purchase as a yearling, overtook front-runner Bodemeister in the final strides of the Kentucky Derby to claim $1.5 million and a 1 1/2-length victory at 13-1. It was the first Derby ride for Mario Gutierrez, and the first Derby win for owner J. Paul Reddam, as well as trainer Doug O’Neil.

Today also marked the first time in history the Derby has been won by a horse from post position #19. Despite the handicap of the next-to-last outside post, I’ll Have Another and Gutierrez manuevered effortlessly to the inside, then ran down second-favorite Bodemeister, at 5-1, who had opened up a 5-length lead coming into the stretch, while setting the fifth fastest set of early fractions in the 138-year history of the race, including the first half in 45.1.

“He is so professional for his age,” said Gutierrez of I’ll Take Another, who he has ridden to 3 wins from 3 starts this year, including the Robert Lewis Stakes at odds of 43-1, and the Santa Anita Derby on April 7. “I always said I would pick this horse over any in the field.”

“He is such a mature colt,” added Reddam, a former University of Southern California philosophy professor turned president of a financial company, who also races harness horses in California and his native Canada.

Betting favorite Union Rags, at 9-2, paid for his slow break to finish sixth; Dullahan (11-1), winner of the Blue Grass Stakes and half-brother to 2009 Derby winner Mine That Bird, placed third at 11-1; Went The Day Well (28-1) finished fourth; and Creative Cause (12-1) was fifth.

Bred by Clarke Harvey and sired by Flower Alley with a stud fee of $7,500, I’ll Have Another sold for $11,000 as a yearling, then was sold again, for $35,000 in the Ocala Breeders 2-Year-Old Sale. Bodemeister, by comparison sold for $260,000 at the Keeneland September Sale.

“I think he showed what a brilliant horse he is,” said three-times Derby winner and Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert of Bodemeister, who would have been the first horse in history to win the Derby without racing as a 2-year-old. “I told Mike (Smith) to let him run the way he wanted to run and I am proud of him.”

Bodemeister, owned by Zayat Stables and sired by Empire Maker, won the April 14 Arkansas Derby, while Baffert was in Dubai recovering from the heart attack he suffered there six weeks ago.

Amanda Smith of Okotoks, Alberta, and Whirl N Play marked 220 to win the $15,000 Novice Non-Pro finals at the 6666 Ranch NCHA Western National Championships in Reno, Nevada, Saturday.

Smith, who had posted the second top score in the go-round, was also a finalist in the same class with Whirl N Play last year.

Bred by Carl Gerwien’s Willow Spring Ranch, Whirl N Play is a 9-year-old mare by CD Whirl out of Playful Little Lana, who in turn was out of Smart Little Lana, an NCHA Futurity finalist from Smart Little Lena’s first crop of foals.

Whirl N Play’s win will take her career earnings over $45,000. She has been a two-time finalist in Mercuria NCHA World Series of Cutting events.

David Booth took the $15,000 Novice Non-Pro reserve championship with a 217 on Crossing Red River, an 8-year-old son of Hes A Peptospoonful that has earned over $135,000.

An eight-year-old with pigtails walks into a neighborhood drugstore in 1954 and asks to buy a package of pipe tobacco. It might have happened, but not for this eight-year-old, who blanched at the thought of being questioned.

Instead, I stared furtively at a counter display which promised that I had a chance to win a Thoroughbred, if I sent in the best name for the colt, plus the wrapper from a package of Kentucky Club pipe tobacco.

Initiated in 1954, the annual Kentucky Club contest received close to a million entries by 1964. One year a bundle of entries (there was no limit on the number of one could submit, as long as each was accompanied by a wrapper) was sent in by a nun who, according to an article in the April 13, 1964 issue of Sports Illustrated, persuaded her pupils’ fathers to save their Kentucky Club wrappers for her.

Another contestant purchased 100 packages of Kentucky Club, tore off the labels so that he could submit 100 names, then gave the contents of the packages to a veterans hospital and claimed a charity deduction on his income tax return.

“Prize” horses in the annual contest were two-year-olds selected by Ted Atkinson, the first active jockey to be inducted into Thoroughbred racing’s Hall of Fame. Atkinson’s mounts included racing giants such as Bold Ruler, Nashua and Tom Fool. Sires of prize horses ranged from Citation to Your Host to Count Fleet, and some of the horses went on to achieve modest success, like Aurecolt, the 1956 selection, who won his first start and $2,600. Others never made it to the post.

While first prize in the contest included a colt, plus two choice seats and all expenses paid in Louisville for four days during the Kentucky Derby, there were a total of 500 prizes, including (second through tenth) hi-fi sets with “full concert realism,” and the remainder, 8-piece sets of English highball glasses decorated with a picture of that year’s prize colt.

Although it might be hard to imagine today, pipe smoking was trendy through 1970, when everyone from Bing Crosby, with his mellow voice and ever-present pipe, to Ronald Reagan endorsed tobacco, and pipe cleaners were something you purchased at the tobacco counter rather than a craft store, as today.

Pipe smoking began to decline in 1970, when cigarette and tobacco advertising was banned on television and radio, and print ads, and packages were required to carry the Surgeon General’s warning. The decline also spelled the end for the Kentucky Club Derby Day contest.