Most normal people spend some of August at the beach. Bloodstock folk do too, though the spade work involves no bucket, just plenty of prowling around the Arqana sales ground looking at yearlings. There may be the odd oyster here and there at the hospitality suites of various consignors but, make no mistake, this is gruelling work.
It's curtain up this Friday for the European yearling sales season, and we all know what that means: Christmas is right around the corner. For breeders and stallion masters, results on the track are important at any time of the year, but they become ever more crucial in the coming weeks and months, with a fresh update providing the pedigree equivalent of gold dust when trying to sell a yearling.
There can be none fresher than the Group 1 victory on Saturday of Amo Racing's Bucanero Fuerte (GB) in the Keeneland Phoenix S. The colt, who is named after a brand of Cuban beer, no doubt prompted the imbibing of a similar product for those closely involved in his career, as he provided a first top-level win for Kia Joorabchian's outfit. He also became the seventh Group 1 winner for his sire, Wootton Bassett (GB). Remarkably, two of those have the same dam, Frida La Blonde (Fr) (Elusive City), with Bucanero Fuerte having followed his brother, the Prix de l'Abbaye winner Wooded (Ire), in snaring a Group 1 success.
When you look at their pedigrees and see the names of Wootton Bassett on top and Elusive City on the bottom line, it is not hard to come to the conclusion that all roads lead to Normandy's Haras d'Etreham, and this is indeed where Frida La Blonde is boarded by her breeder Maurice Lagasse of Gestüt Zur Küste.
The Swiss-based operation has been behind a good deal of decent winners, most notably Teppal (Fr) (Camacho {GB}), the heroine of the Poule d'Essai des Pouliches in 2018 on the same day that another Gestüt Zur Küste-bred, Dice Roll (Fr) (Showcasing {GB}), was third in the Poulains. The G2 Prix Vicomtesse Vigier winner San Huberto (Ire) (Speightstown) won his first stakes race in his breeder Lagasse's colours before being part-sold to OTI Racing.
The pairing of Frida La Blonde, whom Lagasse bred in partnership with Pontchartrain Stud, with Wootton Bassett has also yielded the Group 3-placed Beat Le Bon (Fr), who was her first foal, but the 12-year-old mare has visited Dubawi (Ire) twice since foaling Bucanero Fuerte. Her yearling daughter by the Darley stallion is set to sell on Saturday as lot 214 from the Etreham draft.
I'm going to take a wild guess and say that the Amo team rather likes Wootton Bassett. Robson Aguiar was effusive in his praise of Bucanero Fuerte when he spoke to Brian Sheerin last week ahead of the Phoenix, and he can take much of the credit for presenting Joorabchian, who co-owns the colt with Aguiar's wife Giselle, with a commercial stallion prospect, having bought him last year at Arqana for €165,000.
Then there's the imposing King Of Steel, by the same sire, and surely a Group 1 winner in waiting following his runner-up finishes in the Derby and King George, which sandwiched his victory in the G2 King Edward VII S. The contrasting characteristics of these two colts speak to the versatility of Wootton Bassett as a stallion, with his top runners having struck from five furlongs to a mile and a half. Like their sire himself, a number of them are precocious: Al Riffa, Zellie and Bucanero Fuerte are all Group 1 winners at two, and this set may well expand on Sunday if the Coventry S. winner River Tiber (Ire) can extend his unbeaten record in the Sumbe Prix Morny. Wootton Bassett's record with juveniles was further enhanced over the weekend by the victory of Grey Man (Fr) in the G3 Prix Francois Boutin.
Though Wootton Bassett did not really make his mark beyond his own two-year-old season, he atoned for that from the off at stud as he got the European champion three-year-old Almanzor (Fr) from his tiny first crop born in 2013. His Breeders' Cup-winning daughter Audarya (Fr) excelled at four over 10 furlongs, the same distance over which Incarville (Fr) proved best in the Prix Saint-Alary.
After Almanzor's flamboyant start, there was a three-year wait for another Group 1 winner by Wootton Bassett, but let's not forget that his early crops numbered just 23, 18, 45 and 47. Since Audarya, who was foaled in 2016, there has been a Group 1 winner emerge from each of his five subsequent crops.
Almanzor's sterling work in 2016 meant that the following year there were 92 Wootton Bassett foals, a figure which held more or less steady until the three-figure mark was first breached in 2021, when there were 127 on the ground. That was the last batch conceived at Haras d'Etreham, whose Nicolas de Chambure must take great credit in helping to establish the son of Iffraaj (GB) as one of the most desirable stallions in Europe, so much so that he was bought by Coolmore and has stood at their Irish base for three seasons, commanding a fee of €150,000 for the last two years.
It is safe to say that Wootton Bassett has not been short of suitors in Tipperary. He is listed as having covered 229 mares in 2021 and 249 last year. Their names are as starry as they are abundant. Twenty-six members of his first Irish-conceived crop are catalogued for Arqana this week, among them a daughter of the Oaks winner Was (Ire), who is bred on the cross with Galileo (Ire) that has already yielded Al Riffa, who is set to run in Tuesday's G2 Prix Guillaume d'Ornano. We can expect to see plenty more of his runners bred this way.
With the increase in both the number and the quality of mares that Wootton Bassett has received in recent seasons, it will be a surprise if the exploits of his stock are not filling the racing pages for years to come.
Hot Forecast
Talking of timely updates, the former champion two-year-old Too Darn Hot (GB) was represented by his first group winner at the weekend with a determined performance from Steve Parkin's smart filly Fallen Angel (GB) in the G3 Sweet Solera S.
Simon Marsh, manager of Watership Down Stud where Too Darn Hot was bred, showed a smart turn of foot himself in getting to Newmarket's winner's enclosure to greet the Clipper Logistics colour-bearer, and he was quick to remind us that Too Darn Hot didn't appear on the racecourse until that same week in 2018. From his winning debut in mid-August, he collected a win in every group division to finish the season unbeaten and be crowned champion juvenile. He currently has eight winners from his 33 runners.
Fallen Angel already held the accolade of being her sire's first winner when making a successful debut back in May. She earned her first sliver of black type with a runner-up finish in the Listed Star S., and it would be no surprise to see her chart a similar path to her talented but somewhat ill-fated mother, Agnes Stewart (Ire) (Lawman {Fr}), who won the G2 May Hill S. and was second in the G1 Fillies' Mile.
With injury hijacking Agnes Stewart's three-year-old season, and colic claiming her life after Fallen Angel, the last of her four foals, was born, it would certainly be pleasing for the team at Parkin's Branton Court Stud to welcome her daughter back there eventually. As a Group 3 winner, Fallen Angel has already earned her place in the broodmare band, but let's hope there's plenty more to come on the track first.
Up and Coming
It is the time of year when the juvenile races start to become much more interesting. One would question the wisdom of having the pretty much identical Group 1 contests of the Phoenix S. and the Prix Morny just eight days apart, but this coming Sunday's line-up should be pretty stellar, and will hopefully pitch Christopher Head's filly Ramatuelle (Justify) against the aforementioned River Tiber, whose trainer Aidan O'Brien opted for Deauville over the Curragh, and possibly the recent G2 Richmond S. winner Vandeek (GB). The latter's sire Havana Grey (GB) continues to go from strength to strength and was second in the Morny himself to his stable-mate Unfortunately (Ire).
Amo Racing have rarely been unrepresented in juvenile stakes races this season, and this weekend they could have the G2 Norfolk S. winner Valiant Force (Malibu Moon) in action for Bucanero Fuerte's trainer Adrian Murray as well as the Dominic Ffrench-Davis-trained G2 Duchess of Cambridge S. victrix Persian Dreamer (Ire) (Calyx {GB}).
The Irish National Stud's Phoenix Of Spain (Ire), who beat Too Darn Hot in the Irish 2,000 Guineas, has crept into the picture in the first-season sires' table. He's had just 17 runners to date, but six of them have won, including the G3 Vintage S. winner Haatem (Ire). Similarly, another European Classic winner, Lanwades Stud's Study Of Man (Ire), has made an encouraging start with three winners from just eight runners. His dual winner Deepone (GB), trained by Paddy Twomey, garnered some black type on Friday when a close second to Warnie (Ire) (Highland Reel {Ire}) in the Listed Coolmore Stud Churchill S.
It is also worth noting that City Light (Fr), Etreham's son of Siyouni (Fr), has eight winners from 19 starters, giving him a strike-rate just above 40%.
Inspiral Emulates Miesque
The Prix Jacques Le Marois has become something of a Gosden benefit in the last decade, with John, and later John and Thady Gosden, winning five of the last ten runnings, including four consecutive victories with just two horses: Palace Pier (GB), who is a son of the 2014 winner Kingman (GB), and now Inspiral (GB) (Frankel {GB}). Cheveley Park Stud's four-year-old remained unbeaten as a juvenile and is now a Group 1 winner in each of her three seasons.
Only one other filly, the great Miesque (Nureyev), has won the Jacques Le Marois twice, and in joining her, Inspiral provided Frankie Dettori with an emotional big-race success on his final ride at Deauville. She may yet give him a chance to shine at Santa Anita, with her trainers considering the Breeders' Cup Mile on the first weekend of November after Inspiral's 'win and you're in' success in Deauville.
Thousand Stars
While there was Group 1 action occurring just a stone's throw from his Deauville stable, Stephane Wattel crossed the border to Germany to notch his first win at the top level on Sunday with Simca Mille (Ire) (Tamayuz {GB}) in the G1 Grosser Preis von Berlin.
Torquator Tasso (Ger) and Alpinista (GB) both went on to score in the Arc in the year after winning Hoppegarten's major prize. Perhaps that means we should be following Rebel's Romance (Ire) this year, and Simca Mille in 2024, though Wattel is already eyeing that prize for his four-year-old Haras de la Perelle homebred this season, and rightly so.
Simca Mille has run at Longchamp on four occasions, winning two Group 2 contests, the Prix Niel and the Prix d'Harcourt, and twice finishing runner-up, in the G1 Grand Prix de Paris and G1 Prix Ganay. In fact, he has only ever been out of the first two twice in his 14 starts and it had long appeared to be only a matter of time before he claimed his own Group 1 triumph. Simca Mille also gave his young jockey Alexis Pouchin his second Group 1 victory in as many weeks, following the win of Mqse De Sevigne (Ire) (Siyouni {Fr}) in the Prix Rothschild a fortnight earlier.
Sweeping the Board
Croom House Stud's Sweepstake (Ire) is already a noted matriarch as the dam of the multiple group winners Broome (Ire) and Point Lonsdale (Ire), who are both sons of Australia (GB). Her two youngest racing offspring have both added to the 18-year-old mare's record since the start of August, with Saadiyat (Ire) (Lope De Vega {Ire}) having won at Vichy on Aug. 2 for Al Shira'aa Farms. The juvenile Diego Velazquez (Ire) (Frankel {GB}) followed suit when making a scintillating debut at the Curragh on Saturday to win his maiden by almost five lengths. He was awarded a TDN Rising Star for his efforts.
As a 2.4 million-guinea yearling, he is his dam's most expensive offspring to date, but his siblings haven't exactly been cheap. Sweepstake has certainly done her bit to help balance the Croom House books, as another eight of her offspring have been sold for six-figure sums as yearlings.
From the first crop of Acclamation (GB), Sweepstake became her sire's second stakes winner in the same week that Pencil Hill (Ire) beat her to the punch when holding off You'resothrilling (Storm Cat) to win a Listed contest at the Curragh. This duo emanated from the same crop that also produced the G1 Middle Park S. winner Dark Angel (Ire), who on Saturday was represented by his 100th black-type winner when Heredia (GB) landed the Listed Dick Hern S for owner/breeder Andrew Stone of St Albans Bloodstock.
Fev Takes The Bev
It takes a little adjustment to get used to the Arlington Million and the Beverly D S. being run at Virginia's Colonial Downs rather than in Chicago, but both those Grade 1 contests last Saturday fell to familiar names on this side of the pond.
Juddmonte's Set Piece (GB), by the late Dansili (GB), took the Million. Winner of the Listed Hyde S. and third in the Craven for Hugo Palmer before joining Brad Cox, the seven-year-old gelding has been a solid performer in America with five graded stakes wins to his credit.
Not quite so advanced in years, the Manister House Stud-bred Fev Rover (Ire), now five, continued her admirable career with her first top-level strike in the Beverley D. The daughter of Gutaifan (Ire), who is by the aforementioned Dark Angel, claimed the first of her wins at two in the Listed Star S. for Richard Fahey, before landing the G2 Prix Calvados and finishing fourth in the G1 Prix Marcel Boussac. She was third in the 1,000 Guineas the following May and though she didn't manage another win in Europe, she strung together enough impressive runs to ensure a 695,000gns price tag when she went through the Tattersalls December Sale and was bought by Tracy Farmer. She has rewarded her new owner and her trainer Mark Casse with victories in the GII Canadian S. and GII Nassau S. and two further Grade 1 placings prior to Saturday.
Fev Rover is out of the High Chaparral (Ire) mare Laurelita (Ire), and her three-parts-brother has been catalogued for the Goffs Orby Sale on Sept. 27, selling through breeder Luke Barry's Manister House draft.
Barry was understandably delighted with the latest important update for the family. He said, “We're chuffed to bits. It's becoming more and more important to breed good horses. It's the Group 1 winners that catch people's attention and we've had so many messages from well-wishers.
“She's actually the third Group 1 winner we've sold at Doncaster after La Collina (Ire) and Law Enforcement (Ire). That's always been a lucky sale for us.
“Laurelita's yearling colt was bred specifically to produce a racehorse–it's a good cross–and she is now back in foal to Starspangledbanner.”
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