grades singing
During her seven-year career, three-time Breeders Crown champion Grades Singing made 148 starts in nine countries, with 87 victories in North America and Europe, establishing seven world records and earning over $2.5 million internationally.
Bred by Bay Jean Farm and Stable Ltd. Of Les Cedres, Quebec, Grades Singing was foaled on April 12, 1982 at Dan Gernatt Farms of Collins, New York. She was sold in early 1984 to Gratien Deschenes of Saint-Basile-le-Grand, Quebec for $13,000 US as a two-year-old.
An immediate success on the track, freshman Grades Singing dominated the Quebec stake races in 1984, winning 17 of 20 starts with earnings totaling $169,713 and was voted Canadian Two-Year-Old Filly Trotter of the Year. Her success continued through her 1985 sophomore season, earning her the title of Canada’s Three-Year-Old Trotter of the Year. She won 20 of 25 starts, ten of which were New York and Quebec Sire Stakes races, with $261,309 in earnings.
Grades Singing won 23 of 41 starts during her 1986 four-year-old season, earning $606,544. She was victorious in 18 Open Class Trots at Yonkers where she established an all-age track record of 1:57.4. She also won the Maple Leaf Trot in 1:57.2, equaling the stakes, track, and world record for mares on a five-eighths mile track. Grades Singing won the American Trotting Championship in 1:58.2, the fasted mile trotted at Roosevelt Raceway regardless of age or gender at the time. In 1986 she also became the first Canadian-owned horse to win a Breeders Crown. Grades Singing was named 1986 USTA Aged Trotting Mare of the Year and Canadian Horse of the Year.
In 1987 Grades Singing was sold to a trio of Swedish sportsmen – Rune Andersson, Hans-Gunnar Heed and Christer Brandberg – for a figure in excess of $1 million. Entrusted to Swedish horseman Olle Goop, Grades Singing raced with success on the European Grand Circuit, winning the Olympic Trot, Finlandia-Ajo, Prix Giganten, Gran Premio delle Nazioni, Gran Lotteria and a qualifying heat of the Elitlopp. She finished second in the 1987 Prix d’Amerique and Aby Stora Pris. She set a world standard for older mares with a time of 1:55.4f.m.r. at Biri, Norway, and also won two additional Breeders Crown championships in 1987 and 1989. In 1989 she was named O’Brien Older Trotting Mare of the Year. She retired from racing at age eight. Bred for the first time at nine, Grades Singing produced eleven foals with nine winners. She is the dam of Smashing Victory, winner of an elimination of the 2003 Swedish Trotting Derby.
Grades Singing was inducted into the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame in 1996. She died in Sweden on November 6, 2007 at age 25.