By admin 
With the final crop of yearlings by champion juvenile and former leading freshman sire Uncle Mo (by Indian Charlie) selling at the 2026 Keeneland September sale, breeders and fans should pause a moment and reflect on the accomplishments of one of the sport’s towering figures.
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Literally.
Uncle Mo was a massive individual. He was such a progressive and well-developed juvenile that he was literally, as well as figuratively, head and shoulders above his competition at two, when he was unbeaten in three starts in 2010: a maiden special at Saratoga in late August, the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes at Belmont Park on Oct. 9, and then the G1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Churchill Downs.
Such a campaign made Uncle Mo the leader of his division but also marked him as the leading prospect for the following year’s classic. However, a health scare over the winter led to a slightly delayed preparation, and the colt reappeared at three to win the listed Timely Writer Stakes at Gulfstream on Mar. 12.
In the G1 Wood Memorial on April 9, Uncle Mo was beaten for the first time, when he finished third in the nine-furlong classic prep behind Toby’s Corner (Bellamy Road). Neither the winner nor the odds-on favorite Uncle Mo advanced to race at Churchill Downs for the classic on the first Saturday in May.
In fact, Toby’s Corner didn’t race again until 2012, but Uncle Mo returned to race more than four months later at Saratoga in the G1 King’s Bishop Stakes at seven furlongs on Aug. 29. He ran a cracking race to finish second, a nose behind Caleb’s Posse (Posse), and both earned high speed figures for the fast time performance.
Uncle Mo earned another towering speed figure when he returned on Oct. 1 to win the G2 Kelso Handicap, with a time of 1:33.82 for the mile. After the colt raced in the G1 Breeders’ Cup Classic on Nov. 5, he was retired to stud at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky and began the second phase of his career in the spring of 2012.
If anything, Uncle Mo was even more successful as a stallion than he had been as a racehorse. And his second career began much the same way; Uncle Mo was the leading freshman sire of 2015 with his first crop of racers, and the star of the group was the unbeaten Nyquist, who won each of his five starts at two, including the G1 Del Mar Futurity and then the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile like his sire.
Uncle Mo couldn’t have been hotter if he had been on fire.
Nyquist continued unbeaten through the G1 Kentucky Derby of 2016, which ran the colt’s winning streak to eight. After the Derby, I remarked that I had never seen such an exhausted victor, and the colt’s form never recovered. He trained off after a third in the G1 Preakness Stakes and was unplaced in his two subsequent starts, the G1 Haskell and G2 Pennsylvania Derby.
Although Uncle Mo has not sired another Triple Crown race winner, he has averaged slightly more than 10 stakes winners per crop from a dozen crops of racing age, with 126 stakes winners to date. Among the latest of these is Salahudin, who won the G3 Iroquois Stakes at Churchill Downs on Sept. 12. Racing the mile in 1:36.54 over a fast track, Salahudin won by a half-length over He is No Lie (Early Voting).
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Now unbeaten in three starts, Salahudin earlier won the listed Ellis Park Juvenile and has career earnings of $392,172. Bred in Kentucky by Newstead Corp., Salahudin was bought back at $190,000 at the 2025 Keeneland September yearling sale, then sold for $325,000 a month later at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky October yearling auction.
The buyer was Zedan Racing, who now has a progressive colt with a lot of classic connections, especially through the dam line of Salahudin. The Iroquois winner is the second stakes winner out of Weekend Strike (Smart Strike), and the colt’s second dam is Weekend Storm (Storm Bird).
The latter is a full sister to the high-class colt Summer Squall. He was unbeaten at two from five starts in a campaign that began in April at Keeneland but ended in August with the G1 Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga.
The following season, Summer Squall proved to be the nemesis to champion Unbridled (Fappiano). Summer Squall won the Blue Grass at his beloved Keeneland racecourse, then lost the Kentucky Derby to Fappiano’s finest son. But two weeks later, Summer Squall came roaring back and won the G1 Preakness over Unbridled.
Summer Squall proved to be an important sire during his term at Lane’s End, where he sired Horse of the Year and classic winner Charismatic. His full sister, Weekend Storm, didn’t produce a classic winner, but she did foal four stakes winners and three stakes-placed runners. The most notable of these was Court Vision, winner of the G1 Breeders’ Cup Mile and four other G1 races.
Summer Squall was one of the two classic winners from the third dam of Salahudin. That mare is the legendary Weekend Surprise, one of the most notable daughters of Triple Crown winner Secretariat (Bold Ruler). A graded stakes winner herself, Weekend Surprise produced four stakes winners, including Horse of the Year, classic winner, and classic sire A.P. Indy, who was a son of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew (Bold Reasoning).
If Salahudin should make the necessary progress into his 3-year-old season, and if he should be lucky enough on the greatest day of days, a bit of classic karma for this family and for Uncle Mo too would make the experience even more extraordinary.
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This story was originally published September 16, 2026 at 9:02 AM.