The Heart of a Champion    by Darrell D. Anderson, Solid Rock Llamas

For most of us, we have used the term “the heart of a champion” to describe the mental attitude and toughness possessed by some individual or team in a sporting event. It is that extra edge that some competitors seem to hold over the competition as the race or game comes to the final seconds. It might be described as “desire” or “will to win” and is usually thought of as a nebulous, intangible attribute that is difficult to measure or even define.

That was the assumption until they autopsied the great thoroughbred Secretariat. As most of you sports enthusiasts remember, Secretariat was perhaps the greatest horse of all time. He won the Triple Crown in 1973 – first time a horse had accomplished that feat in nearly a quarter of a century. While doing so, he set a new track record at the Kentucky Derby, a new track record at the Preakness Stakes, and a new world record at the Belmont Stakes. His performance at the Belmont may well be the greatest single achievement by any athlete in the past 50 years as he beat the very best horses in the world by an unbelievable 31 lengths!

Think about that – 31 lengths and if I remember it correctly, he was stretching his lead with every stride. He was the epitome of a horse with the “heart of a champion.” Ironically in 1989, when Secretariat died at Claiborne Farms in Kentucky, his autopsy revealed that his heart weighed approximately 22 pounds – a normal horse’s heart weighs 8.5 pounds. Wow – he was a “big-hearted” champion – literally!

The story gets even more interesting, so please hang with me, because I really do have a point I want to make regarding the breeding of llamas today. After extensive genetic research was conducted, it was determined that this incredible heart is a genetic trait that is carried on the X chromosome. That means that it is a sex-linked trait that is passed down the female line – stallions can pass it on to their daughters, but not their sons.

Even more interesting is the fact that in researching the genetic lineage of this trait, the first reported case of an unusually large heart was traced back to a horse called Eclipse that was foaled in England in 1764. His heart weighed 14 pounds, more than double the normal weight of hearts of that time period. And as you’ve guessed by now, Secretariat and many other famous track winners can be traced directly back to Eclipse. By now I’m sure you’re thinking that it is at this point in this article, that I give my impassioned plea to continue to keep registering those llamas, because you never know when you’ll want to go back 240 years to uncover some unique genetic trait. While that’s not a bad message, and I do think this story is a strong reason to keep up the pedigree base of your herd, believe it or not, that’s not the main point I want to make with this commentary.

Remember, that the first crop of foals sired by Secretariat, were considered by most to be a failure, as few stakes winners were produced. Now we know why, as the one trait that made him a champion was only being passed onto his daughters and not his sons. As a result of this sex-linked genetic trait, most large-hearted sires that were successful racehorses have a consistent pattern of producing better daughters than sons – and get ready here comes the main point – they are not truly appreciated until 10-12 years later, when their daughters begin to produce outstanding racehorses.

Do you see the connection to our business today? How many times have we all tried to evaluate the success or failure of a new herd sire by their first cria crop, results at the first llama show or how many top-selling llamas they produced? Is it possible that maybe it will be their daughters kept back for replacements that will truly have the generating power that could impact not only your herd, but maybe even the entire llama gene pool?

My entire professional life has revolved around the pedigreed livestock industry, and yet the study and application of it continues to amaze me. Let me encourage you to study the pedigrees, identify those sires that continue to have an impact in our industry, and design a program around them. Take advantage of the incredible capabilities of the pedigree search feature available on the ILR web site – your time invested in researching the pedigrees of potential herd sires will be time well spent. And above everything else, be patient as you never know when you might be working with an animal that has the “heart of a champion.”