Mares bred too late in the year can also be crossed off at this point. Eliminate all mares who have four or more foals of racing age and haven't produced a black-type horse. With those four surgical strikes you've eliminated the majority of the mares in the catalog without having had to make a single decision. Step Five brings us to the question of the mare's race record. If she's not such a producer, you have to decide how important it is to you that she have been successful on the racetrack.
Nobody knows how much racing ability adds to a mare's producing potential.
Everyone agrees that racing ability is desirable, but it obviously isn't necessary, because many, many outstanding horses have come from mares who either didn't run or couldn't. But if you're on a limited budget, you may have to take a mare with a race record you don't like. Remember, though, that inferring racing ability from a catalog page isn't as simple as it might appear. You can deal with that problem only by research. These five preliminary steps in the search for desirable broodmares have been simple.