TIZ The Law established himself as the leading contender for the Kentucky Derby, due to be run in September this year, with his weekend victory in the Grade 1 Florida Derby. This win took his race record to four successes in five starts, adding to a Grade 1 triumph in the Champagne Stakes at two.

Tiz The Law is from the first crop of one of the best sons of leading sire Tapit (Pulpit), Constitution, who stands this year for $40,000 at WinStar. They raced him in partnership with Twin Creeks Farm. This is a big jump from the mere $15,000 he cost last year, and that had dropped from the $25,000 at which he started out at stud. If he continues to enjoy the level of success he is currently experiencing, it is certain that his fee will continue to rise.

Besides parentage, Constitution also shares something else with his best son. In 2014, making just his third start and having been unraced at two, Constitution also won the nine-furlong Florida Derby, having previously collected a maiden and an allowance race at Gulfstream Park. He also placed third afterwards in the Grade 1 Clark Handicap. Kept in training, his second season racing yielded just one win in three outings, but it saw him annex the Grade 1 Donn Handicap. He retired to stud with earnings in excess of a million dollars.

Constitution is one of three stakes winners from Bafffled, a daughter of Distorted Humor. She was trained at two by Jeremy Noseda and, having won her maiden, she then ran third at Royal Ascot in the Group 3 Albany Stakes. Her form dipped after that and she was sent to America where she added one more win at three to her record. In addition to Constitution, she is also dam of the Group 2 Superlative Stakes winning two-year-old Boynton (More Than Ready) and the Grade 3 US juvenile winning filly Jacaranda (Congrats).

Baffled is a full-sister to Surfer (Distorted Humor) who won five times in the UAE, his biggest success being gained in the Group 2 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 1, and he was placed there at Group 1 level. Their sibling Emcee (Unbridled’s Song) won half of his eight lifetime starts – mirroring the career of Constitution – and his victory in the Grade 1 Forego Stakes was the highlight.

Tiz the Law is one of five stakes winners from the first crop of Constitution, and remarkably all have been succesful at graded stakes level. Last year his first runners also included Grade 2 winner Amalfi Sunrise and Grade 3 winners By Your Side and Independence Hall, while Laura’s Light joined that group in 2020 following her win in the Grade 3 Sweet Life Stakes. In addition, Constitution’s son Gouverneur Morris was runner-up last year in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity.

Tiz The Law, who sold as a yearling at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Yearling Sale for $110,000, was bred by Steve Davison’s and Randy Gullatt’s Twin Creeks Farm in Kentucky and they purchased his Grade 2-winning dam Tizfiz (Tiznow) for $125,000 in foal to Mineshaft (A.P.Indy) at the 2014 Keeneland November Sale. Her Tapit filly foaled that year realised $525,000 at the following year’s Keeneland September sale and went on to be stakes-placed.

Twin Creeks stands a number of stallion and one of those sires is Mission Impazible (Unbridled’s Song). He is the sire of a two-year-old half-sister to Tiz The Law, named Angel Oak and set to be raced by Twin Creeks, and a yearling half-brother. Not surprisingly, Tizfiz has already been covered by Constitution this year

Gullatt revealed this week that Tizfiz, winner of the nine-furlong Grade 2 San Gorgonio Stakes at Santa Anita, was singled out for purchase prior to sale as she was an outcross for many of their sires. In addition to her Grade 2 victory, she won three other stakes races and was one of three stakes winners from the winning four-year-old Gin Running (Go For Gin).

That trio included Tizfiz’s own-brother Fury Kapcori (Tiznow). Half of his six wins were in stakes, the best being the Grade 3 Precisionist Stakes at Santa Anita. Fury Kapcori was a model of consistency for trainer Jerry Hollendorfer. He won his Grade 3 by nearly six lengths and he was runner-up to Violence in the Grade 1 CashCall Futurity. His first crop are three-year-olds and in January he sired his first stakes winner.

Gin Running is a daughter of the stakes-placed Crafty And Evil (Crafty Prospector), a half-sister to Favorite Trick (Phone Trick) and to the dam of the dual Grade 1 winner Moonshine Memories (Malibu Moon).

In 1997 Favorite Trick became the first two-year-old in 25 years to be voted Horse of the Year in the USA. Trained by Patrick Byrne who had selected him at auction, and ridden by Pat Day in all his races at two, Favorite Trick was undefeated in eight starts in his first season. He won the Grade 1 Hopeful Stakes and Grade 2 Breeders Futurity, and then capped off his year with a win in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile by five lengths in a race record time.

His performances earned him the Eclipse Award for a juvenile colt and he became the first two-year-old since Secretariat to be given the Eclipse Award for Horse of the Year.

At three Favorite Trick’s training was taken over by Bill Mott after Byrne accepted an offer to take over the stable of Frank Stronach. The colt opened his second season with a win in the seven-furlong Swale Stakes at Gulfstream Park, but in the Arkansas Derby, his first attempt at nine furlongs, he suffered his first defeat, finishing third behind Victory Gallop.

Favorite Trick started as second choice in the betting for the Kentucky Derby behind Indian Charlie. However, there was to be no fairy-tale ending and he finished eighth in the 15-runner field behind Real Quiet. He did not contest either the Preakness or Belmont Stakes.

He added three more stakes wins to his CV before he was saddled for the final time, when he was made favourite for the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile at Churchill Downs. He finished eighth in a field of 14 to Da Hoss.

It was announced that he would take up duties as a stallion at Walmac International near Lexington, Kentucky. While he sired 16 stakes winners, overall he was a failure as a stallion and ended his days siring Quarter Horses also. He moved a few times, standing in Ocala, Florida and finally in New Mexico. It was there, at the age of just 11, he and five other horses died in a barn fire.