LEXINGTON, Ky. — Buried on the grounds of Gainesway Farm’s perfectly manicured 1,500 acres are several champion racehorses, including the prolific gray sire Mahmoud, a grandfather of the first gray horse to win the Kentucky Derby.
Not far from the grave site, Tapit, a gray sire whose libido and fertility are rivaling those of the greats, resides in a plush corner stall next to his son Tapizar and across the way from American Pharoah’s grandfather Empire Maker. Tapit is brilliant white now, almost ghostlike, and blends in among the eight white stucco stallion barns.
At 15, he has passed along enough of his “hot blood,” as the stallion manager Carl Buckler likes to call it, to establish himself as a two-time champion sire and to command a $300,000 stud fee, the highest in North America.