The horses cruising burst is really low. It will be reliant on pace and probably not a good horse for the league.

You better off with a horse with 80% potential rating and over 50% cruising burst

I've got to admit that I disagree with u Leon, I think he's looks very interesting and a horse u should bred the hell out of. If u horse wins 50% of his trial races then he would be classed as a monster in u breeding barn. I think u on the right track.

It's interesting that we have different ideas about breeding, it proves there's more than one way to bred horses.

That's indeed interesting. I'm actually doing both now, breeding my best mares to Checkmate as well as trying to add some Cruising Burst. I still had some saved files from stallions from before my crash and there are several with about 60 Cruising Burst but not full potential. I will check and see how their offspring are doing against each other once they're ready to hit the track
Thank you so much for the tips, I really appreciate every one of them.

I think your horse looks good!
BUT
It has low stamina and low battling qualities and a fairly high deterioration bar.
I also agree with Leon with it's cruising burst bar but what a great horse to breed with!
With a little bit of luck he could breed a monster or five

The most important trait you'll find that could be causing you concern with this horse is the Excitable trait.. on his day he looks world class, but then when its not his day and he turns up bolting to the post, you'll find him not running the way you want him too.

Thanks to all of you for your thoughts on the horse. I've been breeding all weekend, but Checkmate hasn't given me anything decent yet. Mostly horses with awful stats and one filly that looked decent stat-wise but prefers to cross the finish line last, in game as well as in CK. So Checkmate is still the best one in trials (IF he isn't having a bad day ) with one filly from other lines that mostly comes in second, but manages to beat him sometimes. I just retired her and will match them together to see what happens

BUT....
I still don't really get it. While trying to add some Battling Qualities I got this guy:



I did compare his stats to Checkmate and I think he should be at least a tiny bit better on the track, but he isn't. Not at all. In a trialling field of 7-8 good horses he's only just mediocre (both, ingame and CK), always finishing in the midfield.
But he does have a better Cruising Burst and a lot more Battling Qualities. All other traits are almost the same. Only Battle Heart here has not a full realized potential. I don't know if it's visible on the picture, but the bar is not completely dark green, there is about 1% light green still.
Also Accelaration is a little bit less than Checkmate's, but therefore his Speed is 100% and he's got a bit more Stamina.
And now comes the funny thing... (or maybe it's a common "problem" and I just didn't stumble over it yet)
.... in a larger field he doesn't leave the midfield, not once in 10 trials. But if I trial just my best three horses and him, he wins 8 out of 10 races. Are there invisible traits at work here?

From my experience the most important stat is actually cruising burst, the higher the better. It means your hold up horses don't need any pace. The other option is to try breed race handy types. I have done that previously and had some success with it. In addition if you can get the extra speed rating to almost full that also helps. The full potential bar is quite common. At present everything I breed has it at some point some at 3 some at 6 depends on the sire /mare

Another thing to aim for is to get a sire of sires. Something that sires a host of horses that are also good sires. This can lead to quantum leaps in your trialing improvements every season. I trial every season, if I haven't improved at least 1 distance then the season is a disappointment. I have limited game time to get my horses up to scratch.

Don't ignore game horses breed with them. If you find a good one branch your game and breed everything with it. Rapid play some seasons in the branched game. Auction all your horses off, except the new horses you breed. At the end of the season look what performs well, when you go back to your original game this will save you heaps of time. Export the best of the new breeds with the game horse and re-import the good ones back into your game to freshen up your lines. Note you will need to keep a backup of every season somewhere. I normally save it in separate folder like so saves NH season 31 Destiny Blue. With Destiny Blue being the game horse I bred from. That way if anything produces decent progeny I can backtrack and breed loads of horses with it.

On another note the sire I posted previously, Doodmaklik , has produced 2 horses good enough for the league. In game everything he sired has won a group 1 race, yet he did not win any group races himself. He has produced some nice looking prospects that have 100 % speed and 100% acceleration. I won't be able to play now until the end of April so will have to wait to see how they develop and what else he produces.

Look out for in breeding. Not mother with son but maybe 2 generations back. The produced horses from these matings tend to be good, which mirrors reality really.

Note my tips are for people who don't play game much ie 30 or so seasons and hope to be competitive in league. To get an exceptional stable for league you probably have to look on the league forums for the way they do it but it takes time that I don't have. I do well enough though and am consistently in top 5 in the league in both codes.

Yeah I very rarely keep or race any excitable horses, and it's even rarer that they make the breeding barn. Just a trait that can ruin a race for any horse.

Thanks for all your help and thoughts and your patience
So I'm now a few generations further and he is not that bad in the breeding barn, but nothing too special either. He only passes on the Excitable trait every now and then, so it's not a big problem. It's quite strange that in his racing career this trait only caused minor problems in 1 out of 10 races, but if one of his offspring inherits the trait they usually blow almost every race due to it. It's astonishing how different horses with similar stats and traits can be.

I'm also trying the branched game tactics right now, with not that much success at the moment, but I think I just have to be patient
And I'm trying to find a gamebred with better cruising burst, but all I managed to find is 60%
It seems even harder to get than battling qualities.