When Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew retired to stud at Spendthrift Farm in 1978, no one could be certain, despite his spectacular race record, that he would become a successful sire. In an era when most stallions bred only 45 mares a season, there were not many opportunities to produce early juvenile superstars to establish a reputation as a leading sire.
Hopes were high when his first crop hit the track in 1982—but even Slew’s connections never imagined the early heights he would reach through the performance of his dark bay daughter Landaluce out of the lightly raced Bold Bidder mare Strip Poker. “Jim (Hill) and I can dream pretty good, but we never imagined Slew would sire something like Landaluce,” admitted Mickey Taylor to then-Daily Racing Form writer Jon White. When Landaluce set world records in her first two starts at Hollywood Park, and demolished the field by twenty-one lengths in the six-furlong Hollywood Lassie Stakes, Slew was immediately launched into the major league stallion ranks. He would end up producing six Grade One winners from his first two crops to race, and by 1984, Seattle Slew would claim the top spot on the North American sires list.
