ITB_September 2020

AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2020

£4.95 • ISSUE 97

First Word featuring guest writer

MARTIN STEVENS

NEW DATE: Arqana Select Sale

September 9-11

Freddy Powell of Arqana, Tim Kent of Goffs UK and Klaus Eulenberger of BBAG talk yearling sales

How the sale of a car led to the buying of a mare, the development of a stud, and the breeding of a Group 1 winner

ARQANA CONSIGNORS • Arcadia Elevage • Agency HSV • Haras de Bourgeauville

Jocelyn de Moubray chats with Philippe Augier, the new president of the PMU

Yearling sales are GO

Bloodstock sales 2020 have seen changes to dates, venues and countries

Continuing his rise Exciting Group victory for unbeaten Bated Breath colt Cairn Gorm, following in the footsteps of subsequent Group 1 winners Earthlight, Ervedya*, Dabirsim, Silver Frost*, Denebola, Xaar, Coup De Genie, Hector Protector*, Kendor*, etc. *Classic Winner

Contact Shane Horan, Claire Curry or Henry Bletsoe

+44 (0)1638 731115 nominations@juddmonte.co.uk www.juddmonte.com

ALREADY IN 2020

the sire of

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STAKES PERFORMERS including

5 GROUP horses

Cairn Gorm | by Bated Breath Prix de Cabourg Gr.3, 6f, Deauville Bred by Hunscote Stud

®

#ontherise

contents august-september 10 First Word

with guest writer Martin Stevens

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15 News

Wootton Bassett to Coolmore, Arqana date changes, Phoenix Thoroughbreds quits UK and Badger explains just how important bonuses are to the British prize-money pot

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She was some mare

The amazing mare Urban Sea is dominating the mid-season European stallion table, writes Aisling Crowe

European stallion stats

Leading sires, leading two-year-old sires and leading first-crop sires’ tables, all courtesy of Weatherbys

Golden girl

How the sale of a car led to the purchase of a broodmare, the buying of a stud farm and the breeding of a Group 1 winner Alpine Star

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European review

The Prix Jacques le Marois winner Palace Pier put in the best three-year-old performance in Europe this year, writes Jocelyn de Moubray

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All change... again

The Arqana Select Sale has moved forward to September 9-11 in response to the UK government’s quarantine rulings.

We chat with Freddy Powell of Arqana, Tim Kent of GoffsUK and Klaus Eulenberger of BBAG regarding the latest plans for the early yearling sales

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September consignors

Jocelyn de Moubray chats with consignors Aracdia Elevage, Agency HSV and Haras de Bourgeauville ahead of September’s Arqana Select Sale

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Fast start

First-season sire Goken hit the delayed season running, and the son of Kendargent has not let up the pace yet

Looking to the future

In June, Philippe Augier became the new president of the successful PMU. After a strong summer for the PMU, we hear the plans he has for the organiation’s future

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French stallion stats

Leading sires and two-year-old sires in France, stats courtesy of Weatherbys

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Photos of the month

Talented jockey Hollie Doyle and the German Group 1 filly Donjah

AUGUST-SEP TEMBER 202 0

AUGUST-

SEPTEM

First Wo featuring guest wrrd iter

MARTIN ST EVENS How the a car led sale of to the bu of a mare,ying the deve of a stud,lopment and the breeding of a Group 1 winner

: Arqana

www.facebo d

ok.com/inte rnationaltho roughbre

Yearling sa les are

Bloodstock sales 2020 have seen changes to dates,

Yearlings at grass

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• ISSU E 97

Se

Freddy Po Septem lect Sale well Klaus Eulenof Arqana, Tim Kent ber 8-10 of berger of BBAG talk GoffsUK and yearling sa les

ARQANA CO

NSIGNOR • Arcadia S Ele • Agency HS vage V • Haras de Bourgeau ville

£4.95

NEW DATE

BER 202 0

Jocelyn de Moubray chats Philippe Au with the new pr gier, esident of the PMU

GO

venues an d countrie s

Photo by Debbie Burt

follow us on twitter @tbredpublishing

contents august-september

Arqana Select Sale preview

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This publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in whole or part without permission of the publisher. The views expressed in International Thoroughbred are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publishers. While every care is taken in the preparation of this magazine, the publishers cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of the content herein, or any consequences arising from them.

the team

the photographers

editor sally duckett publisher declan rickatson photography trevor jones design thoroughbred publishing

thoroughbred photography press association equine creative media and courtesy of stud farms

advertising declan rickatson 00 44 (0)7767 310381 declan.rickatson@btinternet.com subscriptions tracey glaysher 00 44 (0) 1428 724063 itsubs@btinternet.com

the writers martin stevens jocelyn de moubray aisling crowe sally duckett

the stats the printers buxton press

weatherbys

accounts tracey glaysher 00 44 (0) 1428 724063 itaccounts@btinternet.com

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first word

Turning negatives into positives

I

T WOULD be easy to fill this page by listing the disruptions and disappointments that the coronavirus pandemic has created in the bloodstock industry this year.

But we know all too well what they are, having had to wait months for postponed sales, witnessed empty auction complexes when they did resume and then struggled to get to grips with rules surrounding travel and quarantine.

Instead, let’s take a look at some of the unintended positive consequences of the crisis, and speculate about other improvements it might bring about to the business of breeding and buying horses.

First, let’s rewind to when lockdown was first announced in March – slap bang in the middle of the covering season. It was reassuring to see breeders’

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...the necessity of completing breeding forms electronically and emailed prior to covering prevented usual last-minute panics

associations spring into action to ensure mares could still be transported to stallion farms if the strict protocols were adhered to, although insurmountable issues around veterinary work might contribute to a dent in breeding activity in 2020.

Several stud owners reported that the necessity of completing breeding forms electronically and emailed prior to covering prevented the usual last-minute panics over paperwork. Many will likely try to continue with digital documentation to make admin more efficient in future.

During those long, leaden days of lockdown, many breeders and consignors who had lots waiting to be offered at sales that had been indefinitely delayed grasped the opportunity to build websites or a social media presence to advertise their stock.

first word

Guest writer Martin Stevens takes a look at the innovations developed by the bloodstock industry to ensure the continuation of trade under COVID-19 restrictions, and reckons there are a few more items that should be on the agenda

Photo courtesy of Tattersalls

We have had five months selling to empty sale rings, but the bloodstock industry has ensured that the pandemic has not stopped trade

There would surely be few drawbacks in those new converts to digital marketing continuing to promote their wares online when sales return to normal. There is no substitute for seeing horses in the flesh, we all know that; but, equally, it can only be a good thing to allow potential buyers a sneak preview of what’s on offer.

On a similar note, let’s hope that sales companies continue to expand and enhance their online bidding facilities.

Granted, some tried it years ago and it didn’t seem to take off, but this is the third decade of the new millennium and technology is king.

It shouldn’t have taken a worldwide pandemic to expose the backwardness of staging auctions of valuable commodities without participants at home or at work being able to bid remotely on their laptop or mobile.

If someone had told you this time last year that Goffs would be selling lots on behalf of Tattersalls Ireland...

That is not to be interpreted as hectoring the auction houses as, on the whole, they have shown admirable agility in their response to complications caused by Covid-19 and the resulting quarantine measures announced by governments at the drop of a hat.

If someone had told you this time last year that Goffs would be selling lots on behalf of Tattersalls Ireland and the two companies would be swapping auctioneers, you would have thought they were mad.

Okay, Goffs and Tattersalls Ireland are friendly rivals rather than enemies at daggers drawn. But, all the same, who would have thought Goffs chief executive Henry Beeby would ever wish his peers in Fairyhouse “the very best of luck” with their Derby Sale in his post-Land Rover Sale statement?

Such is the spirit of co-operation between all sales

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first word houses in Britain, Ireland and France in order to ensure vendors get the best possible results for their offerings, comments like those have become the new normal this summer.

Long may that collaboration continue – or, rather, for as long as it is in the best interests of customers in these unprecedented times. In usual circumstances there is nothing wrong with healthy competition between businesses.

Now that it has been shown that significant changes to long-standing practices in the staging of sales can be made swiftly, one has to wonder whether it isn’t time to embrace other ideas that could encourage more buyers to part with their money for thoroughbreds?

I

N MY VIEW there are two sacred cows in particular that need to be slaughtered: the continued non-publication of breeze times at two-year-old sales and the industry’s perseverance with an unscientific system of black-type in catalogues.

In a data-driven world, it is surely a question of when rather than if breeze times are eventually declared in an official capacity.

So many new investors in the sport come from the finance sector, where stats guide every major decision; why should we expect them to buy blind, go to the trouble of sourcing their own timing equipment, or rely on sales ground tittle tattle for key information?

Consignors may worry that horses are pushed too hard to achieve quick times, but that eventuality is in their own hands.

In any case, buyers should be trusted to recognise and root out any two-year-olds who might have been drilled for their breeze, and to draw up their shortlists taking physique and pedigree into account along with the evidence of the clock.

Heaven forbid lockdown measures should still be in place next spring. But in case they are, it would be of clear benefit to make more details of the breeze available to prospective purchasers who can’t make it to the racecourse.

The question of catalogue black-type would require a more radical overhaul, but everyone knows it is insufficient as it is, with specious honours awarded to third-placed finishers in weak races that form part of an ever-expanding stakes programme.

Black-type provides a useful shorthand when interpreting a pedigree, no argument there; but the criteria for earning bold lettering should be solid ratings instead of sometimes flimsy one-off results.

Breeders and consignors should not be overly concerned that their mares and young stock would lose out if such a modernisation were made. There would be just as many horses who have performed well in nonstakes races that would be upgraded.

Two big race winners in recent months are good examples of horses being underserved by their pages.

The July Cup hero Oxted is the first black-type

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Oxted: the July Cup (G1) winner (now rated 115) is the first black-type on his page, but his dam, her half-sister and his grand-dam all achieved marks in the 90s

Black-type provides a useful shorthand when interpreting a pedigree, no argument there; but the criteria for earning bold lettering should be solid ratings

performer in three generations of his family and yet his dam Charlotte Rosina boasted a peak official rating of 90, her half-sister Fair Value a best of 92 and their mother Intriguing Glimpse ran to an official mark of 91.

Ventura Tormenta, meanwhile, became the debut black-type runner for his dam Midnight Oasis when he struck in the Group 2 Prix Robert Papin – and yet he remains the third-best of his siblings on RPRs after the smart handicappers George Bowen and Mr Win. That can’t be right.

One way or another it is a period of great change in the bloodstock industry. But one thing has remained a comforting constant: the hard work, good humour and stoicism of its participants.

I’m pleased to say that throughout the crisis I’ve heard next to no whining or wailing about the present sales turmoil.

Everyone has accepted the hand that has been dealt with good grace and they recognise that working with horses, and still being able to enjoy fresh air and wide open spaces, is far preferable to living in cramped conditions in a high-rise block of flats in the city.

An outstanding selection of yearlings for Arqana Including yearlings by Exceed and Excel, Highland Reel, Aclaim, Acclamation, etc.

LOT 376

LOT 378

Half brother to PORT GUILLAUME Won Prix Hocquart Gr.2

Half brother to AXDAVALI 2nd Prix du Bois Gr.3

2020 UPDATE

Guillaume Vitse • Le Lieu Calice, 14430 Hotot en Auge, France • T: +33 6 64 86 28 44 • E: normandiebreeding@gmail.com www.normandie-breeding.com

the news

Above, the sire’s impressive results from the Weatherbys Stallion App, left, the sire offers his new farm an outcross for its Galileo mares

Wootton Bassett to Coolmore The son of Iffraaj has achieved “outstanding results”

W

OOTTON BASSETT has been purchased by Coolmore from Haras d’Etreham.

The son of Iffraaj and winner of the Group 1 Prix Jean Luc Lagardère produced the three-time Group 1 winner Almanzor in his first crop.

Winner of the Prix Jockey-Club, the Irish Champions Stakes and the Champion Stakes, as a three-year-old, Almanzor was the fourth top-rated horse in the world on the 2016 World Racehorse Rankings.

This year Wootton Bassett has been represented at the highest level on the racecourse by The Summit, runner-up in the Poule d’Essai des Poulains and the Prix du Jockey-Club, while Wootton also finished fourth in the Prix Jean Prat having won the Prix Tex Anita (G3) in May. The fillies Speak Of The Devil and Mageva finished second and third in the Poule d’Essai des Pouliches (G1).

Recently, the 110-rated Beat Le Bon trained

by Richard Hannon, finished second in the Group 3 Sovereign Stakes. Hannon also trains the exciting two-year-old Chindit, who won the Winkfield Stakes at Ascot. The colt was bred from the first crop conceived after the

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stallion’s fee rose from €6,000 to €20,000.

“From his initial small crops in France, Wootton Bassett has achieved outstanding results,” said David O’Loughlin, Coolmore’s director of sales.

“His first crop of just 23 foals included Classic winner and European champion three-year-old Almanzor, he’s had two other colts finish second in the Prix du Jockey-Club and two fillies finish second, beaten only a nose, and third in this year’s French Guineas – and this all from €6,000 nominations or less.

“He strikes us as a real Classic stallion, he gets a very good type and is a total outcross with his pedigree free of the major European forces like Sadler’s Wells, Galileo, Montjeu, Danehill, Green Desert, Invincible Spirit, Danehill Dancer and Dubawi.

“We are thrilled that he is coming to Coolmore and are very excited about what he might achieve when paired with our Galileo mares.”

Wootton Bassett’s 2020 foals were bred off his current fee of €40,000. He has yet to have a runner out of a Galileo mare.

He is currently fourth in the French stallion table with 17 winners, 20 race wins, and five stakes winners.

“It has been an amazing journey, a real pleasure and a great pride for everybody at Etreham to be involved in Wootton Bassett’s stud career as he established himself as the most exciting up-and-coming sire in Europe,” said Haras d’Etreham’s Nicolas de Chambure.

“With his best-bred crops yet to run I have no doubt that he has a brilliant future ahead of him and the quality of the broodmare band at Coolmore will give him a wonderful opportunity to continue his upward trajectory.

“It is, of course, with a touch of sadness that myself and the team at Etreham will see him leave the farm however, we are looking forward to the first yearlings this year by his best son Almanzor and to retire the dual Group 1 winner Hello Youmzain in 2021.

“I would also like to thank all the shareholders and all the breeders that have supported Wootton Bassett during his eight seasons at Etreham.”

Almanzor stands at Etreham at a fee of €35,000. His first yearlings will be offered this autumn with one lot due to go through the ring at the GoffsUK Premier Sale, and 32 lots catalogued for the Arqana Select Sale.

the news

UK quarantine regulations lead to Arqana Select Sale changes And the Irish government’s rulings may cause venue changes THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT’s quarantine restrictions requiring travellers from France to quarantine for 14 days has led to Arqana moving forward its Select Sale from an original rearranged date on September 23 to new dates of September 9-11.

Arqana’s CEO Eric Hoyeau and executive director Freddy Powell commented: “The catalogue for the Select Sale is of outstanding quality and we are committed to providing these exceptional young horses with the best possible marketplace.

“This requires holding the sale at a time that maximises the chances for French and international buyers to be in attendance in Deauville.

“We wish to pay tribute to the reactivity and adaptability of all our vendors, who have immediately thrown their support behind this unusual change.”

As we went to press, the Irish government also announced further restrictions through initially to September 13 due to a rise in coronavirus cases in Ireland.

AS WE WENT to press, major news outlets were reporting that it is believed the UK government is to discuss plans to scrap blanket quarantine measures.

Instead, arriving passengers will be able to book swab tests and have results sent to them in seven hours under the proposal, which is already being used in Germany and Iceland.

Travellers can then do a second test at home a few days later and leave quarantine early if they pass both checks.

Heathrow Airport has also announced that it has developed a new testing facility, which it hopes will lead to the end of quarantine for those returning from certain countries.

It claims that more than 13,000 passenger tests could be carried out each day using the existing facility, and scaled up if required.

It is not known yet, if either facility were deemed to be feasible options by the government, how quickly the measures could be operable.

One of the main restrictions put forward by the Irish government is a ban on outdoor gatherings of over 15 people. It must mean that the successful staging of a yearling sale in Ireland, even with appropriate social distancing measures, will be difficult.

Tattersalls Ireland and Goffs have both stated that a decision as to venues for their company’s yearling sales would not be made until the conclusion of the NH store sales.

“We will continue to monitor the situation and look at any and all options as matters evolve, but we would reiterate that the modern-day Goffs was set up to provide a world-class sales facility in Ireland and to serve the Irish breeder,” said Goffs managing director Henry Beeby ahead of Land Rover Sale.

“At the same time we have a superb sales complex in the UK so we have options to serve the industry on both sides of the Irish Sea.” The Goffs Champions Sale will take place as an online timed auction from Wednesday, September 9 to Friday, September 11.

Magnier and Yulong breaking records in the southern hemisphere IN AUSTRALIA, the champion mare Sunlight smashed the all-time Magic Millions auction record and the southern-hemisphere record for a race filly or mare sold at public auction when bought by Coolmore’s Tom Magnier for A$4.2 million on day one of the National Broodmare Sale on the Gold Coast.

“We are very lucky to have got her,” said the delighted Magnier of Sunlight, one of his three seven-figures purchases at the sale.

“She is a lovely-looking mare and she was unbelievable on the racetrack, not only did she beat her own age, she beat the boys.”

“She is a filly of a generation and we are very lucky to have got her and there were a lot of good people involved in her and there were a lot of people around the world who had their eyes on her, so to take her back to Coolmore in the Hunter Valley is exciting and she will visit Justify.”

Magnier was repeating his brother’s actions at Tattersalls December Sale in 2017 – then MV Magnier broke the European record for a race filly sold at auction when he bought the dual-Group 1 winner Marsha for six million guineas.

Twenty minutes after Sunlight’s sale at Magic Million, another record was broken –this time the mare Unforgotten became the most expensive lot sold to an online bidder in Australia.

She was knocked down for A$2.75 million to Yulong Investments with Yuesheng Zhang bidding online.

The Australian Oaks winner was prepared during her top-class career by Chris Waller.

Yulong’s bloodstock manager Luke Wilkinson said: “Mr Zhang was bidding online, so we weren’t aware which leg he was on and we didn’t know until the phone rang

afterwards from his son-in-law that we knew that we’d secured her.”

On the final day of the sale Yulong also purchased Viddora for a session-topping A$2.55 million, Zhang again bidding online.

During a career that netted multiple Group 1 wins, the daughter of I Am Invincible won over A$2.8 million in prize-money.

Presented in-foal to Lope De Vega on a first cover, Viddora attracted an opening bid of A$1 million.

“Mr Zhang had talked about her for the Everest slot, so he knows the mare well and he adores Lope de Vega,” said Williamson.

“We probably valued her at A$2-$3 million and it was just dependent on who we were bidding against. Mr Zhang is at home bidding online, but there were text messages asking who he was bidding against.”

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the news

RIP Coral Pritchard-Gordon AFTER AN 11-MONTH BATTLE with illness Coral PritchardGordon, co-founder of the Newmarket branch of the MS Society and long-time partner of trainer Sir Michael Stoute, died in August at the age of 73.

Born in Ireland, PritchardGordon, daughter of Paddy Harbord, who founded the Curragh Bloodstock Agency, and niece of Champion Hurdle and Irish Oaks-winning jockey Aubrey Brabazon, she was

formerly married to trainer Gavin Pritchard-Gordon.

She leaves two sons Rupert, who is racing manager to Al Shaqab in France, and Paddy, a successful estate agent.

She rode out everyday when

younger and on one occasion finished third in the Newmarket Town Plate.

She was with Stoute for 30 years, fully involved in the yard alongside her activities with the MS Society.

The double act

Bonuses so important

Brazen Belle: has won two Great British Bonus Scheme awards totalling £40,000. A €5,000 buy-back at the GoffsUK September Sale, she has run five times, won twice, been placed twice and finished eighth in the Super Sprint. She has won £12,228 in prize-money earnings

W

HILE IT was a fantastic effort by all parties concerned to get racing back in June, there is absolutely no doubt that COVID-19 will be leaving its mark on the bloodstock industry… the extent of which will not be clear until the end of 2020.

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It could be a massive hit that will cause sadness and devastation across all sections of our equine world.

But the key word in all of this is prize-money.

Through the period on the UK without racing owners had three months of paying bills without any returns whatsoever.

Ownership loyalty was then

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tested again when a restricted race programme and slashed prize-money was the next part of the punishment.

The inability to go racing to see their horses run removed a major element of enjoyment, and even stable visits were severely curtailed. Nothing beats getting “close up and personal” with your horses.

All of this will put enormous

pressure on decisions about reinvesting in yearlings or maintaining the numbers of broodmares.

We will see the extent of the fall-out in the next few months of auctions – so long as they are able to proceed; the fear of a second wave of the wretched virus causing sleepless nights to consignors and auction companies.

the news Amongst the many tributes Chris Richardson, racing manager for Cheveley Park Stud, said to the Racing Post: “Coral was the power behind the throne at Freemason Lodge and was a truly wonderful lady who was always cheerful, bubbly and bright.”

The late Coral Pritchard Gordon with Sir Michael Stoute after Conduit won the St Leger in 2008

“

Good news has been hard to find, especially in monetary terms, but the newly launched Great British Bonus has already put a broad smile on the faces of 29 winning connections

“

As the British Chancellor of the Exchequer quickly realised, it is essential to keep the money circulating to enable businesses to survive.

The bloodstock industry is no exception.

At least with racing back in action, some money has trickled back into owners’ coffers resulting in trainers, jockeys and stable staff getting relative security back into their lives.

We have already seen some casualties and the loss of Ed Vaughan to our training ranks is a tragedy – charismatic horsemen such as him are the backbone of our attraction to the outside world.

Sadly, many trainers and staff are likely to follow the same direction.

Auctions of breeze-up horses, breeding stock and store horses have taken place at Tattersalls and GoffsUK under the necessary Covid restrictions, which does not make for a pleasant atmosphere for those professionals that have to attend.

However, horses have been sold and cheques dispatched. The market has been down, but most were pleasantly surprised as to its buoyancy, and trade has taken place.

The virus has not stopped the industry in its tracks, but the effects are clear to everyone.

Parts of the industry have risen to the challenge in admirable style.

Through the efforts of the Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association, the British government was persuaded to let the thoroughbred breeding season continue and the majority of mares were covered.

The BHA worked closely with other industry stakeholders to get racing restarted.

And the media has performed wonders with new technology to keep audiences involved.

In fact, ITV have been outstanding in its endeavours and has actually grown its audiences consistently.

As a result, betting turnover will have been helped considerably, which will hopefully mean that the HBLB can drive prize-money back to previous levels sooner rather than later.

Good news has been hard to find, especially in monetary terms, but the newly launched Great British Bonus

(GBB) has already put a broad smile on the faces of 29 winning connections.

Since its start in May over £500,000 in bonus prizes has been distributed to winning eligible fillies and NH mares.

A filly born in Great Britain sired by a British-based stallion can win bonuses of up to £20,000 per race…. and in multiple races, too.

Two fillies have already won £40,000 for their connections.

Brazen Belle, owned and bred by Kevin Nicholson and trained by David O’Meara, won her first £20,000 bonus in June when scoring at Beverley on debut.

She picked up her second in a 6f fillies’ novice at Catterick and while she has now earned £12,228 on the track, she has picked-up a huge £40,000 in bonuses!

Simon Chappell’s homebred filly Blackberry has also claimed two bonuses, most recently winning a 5f fillies’ novice at Doncaster in August.

GBB is helping at every level of the racing and breeding industry.

Yearlings costing as little as £5,000 have won bonuses of up to £20,000 – international owners/breeders have also benefited, as has a syndicate that bought its horse for only £17,000.

And two NH mares have won bonuses, too.

GBB is also encouraging inward investment from overseas markets, demonstrated by a £20,000 bonus collected by Emotional Moment, trained by Newmarket’s Amy Murphy for Gerry Ryan, an owner from Melbourne, Australia.

The scheme is also having a positive effect on the sales ring.

While there have been headline sales of GBB-eligible fillies making six-

figure prices at the recent breeze-up and NH store sales, the most obvious benefit has been the much better clearance rate of GBB-eligible fillies compared with other fillies that passed through the ring.

The GBB has been promoted by the TBA and is a hugely important selfhelp scheme for the Industry.

It is funded by registration fees from owners and breeders, with the scheme underwritten by the HBLB. It will hopefully provide a massive incentive for owners to buy Britishbred yearling fillies at the sales this autumn.

With such paltry prize-money currently on offer, trainers and bloodstock agents have a duty of care to their clients to point them in the direction of bonus schemes that can actually provide a meaningful reward for winning a race.

The GBB scheme prides itself on being an inclusive rather than exclusive scheme.

Eligible GBB fillies are always running in “open” company... unlike the restricted races that prevail across Europe.

Fillies sired by stallions standing outside of Great Britain are included in the scheme... they just have to be foaled in Great Britain to be eligible.

Payments can be won by overseas breeders and pinhookers, too. With GBB eligibility established, overseas consignors at British sales can expect to see an uplift in their stock’s value as the scheme gains momentum.

Imagine buying a GBB-eligible filly from Tattersalls Book 1? With the Tattersalls £25,000 and the GBB £20,000 bonuses combined, an owner could win two years’ training from his filly’s first win.

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Europe’s Leading Source of Classic/Group 1 Winners

2020 TAT T E R S A L L S O C T O B E R YEARLING SALE

PALACE PIER

St James’s Palace Stakes, Gr. 1, Prix Jacques le Marois, Gr. 1, etc.

Purchased at Tattersalls October Yearling Sale, Book 1

BOOK 1 October 6 – 8 featuring the £20,000 Tattersalls October Book 1 Bonus

Tel: +44 1638 665931 sales@tattersalls.com www.tattersalls.com

the news

Phoenix Thoroughbreds to quit UK Head of US operations Tom Ludt leaves the the group in August PHOENIX THOROUGHBREDS, whose founder Amer Abdulaziz has been named in the US OneCoin case, has said that it will remove all its horses in training in the UK. A press release from the organisation said: “The management at the Dubai-based organisation will halt racing operations across the UK until further notice. This difficult business decision has been taken after consultation by the management team and the company has informed all its partners in the UK. “Everybody at Phoenix Thoroughbreds is keen for investment into the international sport of racing and in the past few years has been fully committed to healthy growth.

“The company has conducted itself appropriately, despite certain media outlets claiming otherwise. It is in no small part down to the unfair treatment from an industry media outlet that this decision has been taken.”

The organisation added: “In the UK, Phoenix Thoroughbreds have, to date, raced 41 horses in 170 races. The company employed 11 trainers and helped facilitate the employment of approximately 300 stable staff, administration workers and those working in supporting industries. Phoenix Thoroughbreds has always fully cooperated with the British Horseracing Authority and has always been and continues to be registered, compliant with and operates to the highest standards within the industry.”

At the beginning of August, Tom Ludt stepped down from his position as head of US operations. Ludt joined Phoenix Thoroughbreds in December 2017 and according to the Racing Post report accepted a termination agreement from Abdulaziz.

Last year, bloodstock agent Dermot Farrington and then trainer Martyn Meade moved away from Phoenix after the New York courtroom allegations emerged.

According to reports Ludt “confronted” founder Abdulaziz over claims he was linked

Multi-million bloodstock spending OVER THE last two sales seasons Phoenix Thoroughbreds has not been shy about spending money on horses around the world, and in the northern-hemisphere alone has had an outlay of over £25 million at public bloodstock sales.

At 2019’s Arqana August Sale, the organisation bought four lots for €1,460,000, topped by the purchase of the Galileo colt out Step Amach for €800,000.

The group then went on to buy three lots at the Goffs Orby Sale for €640,000 and six lots at Tattersalls October Book 1. Its most expensive purchase at Newmarket was the Frankel colt out of Attraction sold by Floors Stud for 525,000gns. Under its own name Phoenix bought six lots for 1,230,000gns.

But it was 2018 which was a really big spending year for the group.

At the 2018 Orby Sale, €5,990,000 went on six lots, including the purchase of Galileo fillies out of Green Room and Aleagueoftheirown for €3,200,000 and €2,000,000.

At Tattersalls Book 1 and Book 2, 2,055,000gns was spent on eight lots.

Phoenix then went onto buy the broodmare Pocketfullofdreams for 1,000,000gns, three further broodmares and also retained the Queen Mary Stakes (G2) winner Signora Cabello, a share in whom Phoenix had purchased privately before Royal Ascot, for 900,000gns at Tattersalls December Sale 2018.

Phoenix had also bought into subsequent three-time Group 1 winner Advertise ahead of Royal Ascot 2018, and purchased two lots at that spring’s Arqana Breeze Up Sale, including the €700,000 third top lot.

The year previously, at the same Arqana sale, Phoenix, through agent Kerri Radcliffe, spent €1,400,000 on the Street Sense colt subsequently named Walk In The Sun, Gronkowski for 300,000gns at the Craven Sale and Al Battar at Arqana August for €1,550,000.

In the US through 2018-2019 Phoenix bought 37 lots for $13 million, its top purchase being the Medaglia D’Oro colt bought for $2.1 million at the 2018 September Yearling Sale.

Since the beginning of 2018, in addition to its huge spend at Keeneland, Phoenix has spent in excess of six million guineas at Tattersalls, a similar amount in euros at Goffs, and over €3 million at Arqana.

Amer Abdulaziz of Phoenix Thoroughbreds

to the fraudulent cryptocurrency OneCoin.

Abdulaziz denies the allegations, which first came to widespread public attention in November.

Abdulaziz was accused from a New York court by Konstantin Ignatov, a prosecution witness during the trial of a lawyer Mark Scott, who was convicted of conspiracy to commit money laundering and bank fraud last week for his involvement in the OneCoin cryptocurrency scam. Ignatov had himself pleaded guilty to charges.

It is estimated that £4bn was raised by what has been described as akin to a Ponzi scheme.

In testimony live-tweeted by the journalism website Inner City Press, Ignatov reportedly referred to Abdulaziz as “one of the main money launderers” involved in the scheme.

Ignatov continued: “After he stole €100m from OneCoin, he started buying racehorses for, like, €25m.”

Following the publication of these allegations, which have been denied by Phoenix, Ludt sought further assurances that the claims were without foundation.

In a statement released last November – the only direct comment Phoenix or Abdulaziz have provided concerning the money laundering allegations – the group said: “Phoenix Fund Investments LLC categorically denies all allegations made against it, and its owner, Mr Amer Abdulaziz, in legal proceedings against OneCoin and its conspirators in the US.”

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19

THE FRENCH TOUCH Lot 2

F.Siyouni x Zain Al Boldan

Sister to Chevalier Cathare recent winner of the Prix du Logis, Deauville Sold by Haras des Capucines at Arqana

Lot 52

F.Dark Angel x Clarmina

Sister to AL RUFAA, 3 consecutive wins for John Gosden Sold by Haras des Capucines at Arqana

Haras des Capucines will be delighted to either welcome you to the stud, or to send you videos and photos of our yearlings prior to the sale.

Please contact us at: harascapucines@wanadoo.fr for any information

INTERNATIONAL SIRES LE HAVRE (2) LOPE DE VEGA (2) MUHAARAR NATHANIEL NO NAY NEVER (2) OLYMPIC GLORY PEDRO THE GREAT RELIABLE MAN RIBCHESTER

SHALAA (5) SHOWCASING SIYOUNI (4) STARSPANGLEDBANNER TORONADO WOOTTON BASSETT (4) ZARAK

Éric Puerari : +33 (0)6.07.34.38.24 • Michel Zerolo : +33 (0)6.08.91.04.34

© Agence G / Zuzanna Lupa

ALEX THE WINNER ALMANZOR (4) CAMELOT DABIRSIM (6) DARK ANGEL (2) DREAM AHEAD (3) GALILEO INVINCIBLE SPIRIT KINGMAN

mid-season review

She was some

Between them, this year the half-brothers Galileo and Sea The Stars are sires of seven Group 1 winners.

Main picture Galileo’s son Serpentine gallops away with the Epsom Derby, seen here putting distance between himself and the field around Tattenham Corner.

Inset, the amazing Stradivarius (Sea The Stars) wins his fourth Goodwood Cup

mare

Urban Sea’s extraordinary influence continues and the amazing matriarch is dam of the current leading two stallions in Europe.

Aisling Crowe offers a mid-season assessment of the European sires’ table

T

HERE ARE a number of interesting things to note about the current European leading sire tables at their mid-season state, headed as is customary by Coolmore Stud’s Galileo.

Most strikingly the top two positions are occupied by half-brothers – Galileo is leading his younger sibling Sea The Stars.

It’s the norm for the best stallions to have more than one leading sire son or for a son to join his father as is the case currently with Shamardal and Lope De Vega, but for a broodmare to produce the two best stallions in Europe is quite an astonishing achievement.

Urban Sea’s position at the head of a dynasty is certainly assured and for all the

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legitimate talk of Galileo as an unparalleled shaper of the thoroughbred, the role of his dam cannot be understated.

She is rightly praised for her four Group 1-winning offspring, headed by the champion Sea The Stars, but all nine of her foals to run were black-type performers, with three more of them – Melikah, All Too Beautiful and Born To Sea – placed in Classics.

Her daughters, granddaughters and now great-granddaughters are producing Group 1 winners, but the achievement of producing the two stallions that currently sit atop Europe’s league table of sires is extraordinary.

Through their careers between them Galileo and Sea The Stars have sired over 100 individual Group 1 winners,with the former a record breaker in that department.

This year alone they have sired the winners of the Derby, the Oaks, the English and Irish 1,000 Guineas, the Preis der Diana, the Ascot Gold Cup, the Pretty Polly Stakes, the Tattersalls Gold Cup and the Goodwood Cup, as well as the first two home in the Queen Anne Stakes.

At the time of writing, Galileo has had 20 European stakes winners this season, while his younger half-brother has had ten.

Between them they have also earned over £5m in prize-money so far this season, quite an achievement given the funding cuts the sport has suffered. Their strike-rates are quite similar, too, with Sea The Stars siring 32 per cent winners to runners and his elder brother achieving 29 per cent.

Third this year is Siyouni and he looks

mid-season review

set for his best place finish yet. The Aga Khan Stud-based stallion benefited from the early resumption of racing in France and the good prize-money in the country, but his results are much deeper than that and are a reflection of ongoing growing presence in the stallion ranks.

He has had two Group 1 winners this year – Sottsass, his Prix du Jockey-Club winner of 2019 won the Prix Ganay in June, and Dream And Do took the Poule d’Essai des Pouliches.

With 73 winners he is alongside Kodiac (97), Dark Angel (82), Zoffany (75), Lope De Vega (68), Dandy Man (67) and Dubawi (60) with 60 or more individual European winners so far this year.

Kingman is getting towards double figures this season on the European stakes

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mid-season review winners’ table, Camelot is creeping forward with eight, Frankel is on seven, a number matched by Sea The Moon, who is rewarding the shrewd support he has had from breeders and investors. He achieved his first progeny Group 1 victory this year with Alpine Star’s Royal Ascot Coronation Stakes (G1) success.

Sea The Moon is, of course, another descendant of Urban Sea as son of Sea the Stars and is currently a highly affordable £15,000.

One behind the Lanwades Stud sire on the stakes winners register for 2o2o is Coolmore’s new purchase Wootton Bassett.

strike-rate of 38.46 per cent.

Most impressively from such a small pool Coulsty has produced a Group winner. His daughter Santosha won the Group 3 Princess Margaret Stakes at Ascot after a narrow defeat in the Group 2 Duchess Of Cambridge Stakes, proving herself to be a proper Group horse and shining the spotlight on her sire’s achievements.

Second-season sires head by Belief

Mr. Prospector dam-sire influence

The other noticeable statistic about the top ten sires in Europe is five of them have Mr. Prospector line broodmare sires – Galileo and Sea The Stars are out of a Miswaki mare, Dark Angel and Shamardal have Machiavellian as their dam-sire, while Camelot is out of a mare by Kingmambo.

A sixth stallion, Zoffany, sits just outside the top ten at number 12 in the rankings but is also out of a mare by Machiavellian, while Dubawi is from the Seeking The Gold branch of Mr. Prospector’s sire line.

Interestingly, this trend is replicated with the first-season sires – two of the top three, Mehmas and Territories, are out of Machiavellian mares, while Prince Of Lir has Whipper as his broodmare sire and Buratino’s dam-sire is Kingmambo.

Kodi Bear is out of a mare by the Woodman stallion Mujtaahid and New Bay is out of a Zamindar mare.

First-season sires dominated by Mehmas

The partnership between Tally-Ho Stud and Al Shaqab Racing could not have started any more beautifully as Mehmas, the first Al Shaqab stallion to stand at the O’Callaghan family’s farm, has become the breakout star from the first-season stallion ranks this summer.

Despite a truncated season, the son of Acclamation has already amassed 20 individual winners, which is no mean feat in spite of the strong support the Group 2 winner received from breeders.

Mehmas has 146 two-year-olds and, of them, 64 have made it to the racecourse since early June with 20 of them winning at least once with a winners to runners ratio of 31.25 per cent.

His success is not solely down to sheer force of numbers as there is quality too

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Alpine Star (Sea The Moon) wins her Group 1

amongst his early runners – the Clive Coxtrained Supremacy emulated his sire when winning the Group 2 Richmond Stakes at Goodwood and that victory followed on from the success of the unbeaten Method in the Listed Rose Bowl Stakes.

Muker has won two of his three starts and was third in his other run, in the Listed Windsor Castle Stakes at Royal Ascot.

A further 20 of his runners have been placed which means that roughly two-thirds of his starters have managed to either win or be placed, which is another impressive point in his favour.

When it comes to two-year-old winners, currently only his Tally-Ho stud-mate and prolific source of juvenile talent Kodiac is ahead of him in the race to be crowned Europe’s leading two-year-old sire.

Rathasker Stud’s Coulsty lacks the weight of numbers that many of his compatriots possess, but the son of Kodiac, one of four by the stallion in the top 12 leading first-season sires’ rankings, is punching well above his weight.

From his first crop of just 44 foals, 13 of them have made it to the racetrack so far with five individual winners for a

Make Believe, who stands at Ballylinch Stud, became the first stallion from his cohort to sire a Group 1 winner when Mishriff won the Prix du Jockey-Club for John Gosden, Frankie Dettori and owner-breeder Prince Faisal, who raced Make Believe.

A Classic winner himself in France, but in the shorter Poule d’Essai des Poulains, Make Believe was quietly getting on with the business while other sires from his class were making headlines.

Rose Of Kildare was the standout member of his crop at two, Mark Johnston’s bargainbuy winning the Oh So Sharp and Firth of Clyde Stakes (both Group 3 races). At three she has added the Group 3 Musidora Stakes and has subsequently been purchased by Qatar Racing.

She is one of four stakes winners from the first crop of the Group 1 Prix de la Fôret winner by 2000 Guineas winner Makfi. He is now at stud in Japan, which increases his son’s desirability amongst breeders.

As well as Rose Of Kildare and Mishriff, who added the Group 2 Prix Guillaume d’Ornano to his Derby triumph and is now amongst the favourites for the Arc, Make Believe is also the sire of Group 3 Preis der Winterkonigin winner Ocean Fantasy and Listed winner Tammani.

With 22 individual winners from 59 runners, Make Believe’s winners to runners ratio of 37 per cent is bettered only amongst the top ten by Night Of Thunder, whose own strike rate is 45 per cent.

He also has four individual Group winners this season from his first crop with the unbeaten Group 2 Oaks d’Italia winner Auyantepui, Thunderous, winner of the Dante Stakes (G2), as well as Group 3 winners Molatham and No Limit Credit. Night Of Thunder also has five Listed winners amongst his three-year-olds.

Honourable mention must also go to the Irish National Stud’s Free Eagle (High Chaparral) – who has Derby runner-up and Listed Cocked Hat Stakes winner Khalifa Sat in his first crop.

CLODOVIL

GREGORIAN

TIGER TANAKA Gr.3 Prix Francois Boutin

GREGORIAN

R AT H A S K E R STUD

QUEEN JO JO Gr.3 Summer Fillies Stakes

GREGORIAN

SU C CES S I N 2 0 2 0

CLODOVIL

COULSTY

FAIRY DUST 2nd Listed St Hugh’s Fillies’ Stakes

PLAINCHANT Listed Criterium de Bequet

RATHASKER GRADUATE

RATHASKER GRADUATE

STEEL BULL Gr.3 Molecomb Stakes BUNGLE INTHEJUNGLE

BODHICITTA Gr.2 Yellow Ribbon Stakes

ACAPULCO GOLD Listed Prix des Reves d’Or

SANTOSHA Gr.3 Princess Margaret Stakes RATHASKER GRADUATE

LAW OF INDICES Gr.2 Railway Stakes

QUE AMORO Listed Land O’Burns Fillies Stakes

MAURICE OR MADELINE BURNS Rathasker Stud, Kilcullen Road, Naas, Co. Kildare, Ireland.

T 00 353 (0)45 876940 M 00 353 (0)86 2500687 or 00 353 (0)86 3774430 E info@rathaskerstud.ie W www.rathaskerstud.com

euro racing

Palace Pier: the son of Kingman pictured here winning at Royal Ascot.

He went on to win the Prix Jacques le Marois, putting in the best performance seen in Europe by a three-year-old so far in 2020

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euro racing

Pier stretches clear

Palace Pier adds a second Group 1 to his resumé impressing when beating the older horses at Deauville, writes Jocelyn de Moubray

A

DAY AT THE RACES in Deauville in August felt remarkably like, well a day at the races in Deauville. If you shut your eyes the noise of the enthusiastic crowd, the horses, the jockeys, the seagulls all as we are used to; it was only the masks the humans were wearing which marked out the difference.

French racing has rarely felt more privileged as the show goes on with prize-money which is, now more than ever, the envy of the rest of the European racing world.

Trainer John Gosden was unable to be there in person but his horses, as usual, performed at their very peak.

Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed Al Maktoum’s Palace Pier put up the best performance of any European three-yearold to date in 2020 when taking the Group 1 Prix Jacques le Marois by three-quarters of a length from the Niarchos family’s Alpine Star with the other Group 1 winners left five and more lengths behind them.

The son of Kingman, who was bred in partnership by Highclere Stud and Floors Farming, came from behind in a very fast-run race and put up an excellent overall time.

France Galop now provides full tracking times for each horse in every race at the main French tracks, and it provides a treasure trove of data.

The ground was officially heavy for the weekend of the Jacques le Marois, but the data suggests it was more like soft.

Palace Pier ran the straight mile in 1m38.06s, 3.84s faster than his sire did

in the same race in 2014 and 6.24s faster than Dubai Millennium, who won a famous renewal in 1999 when the ground really was heavy.

The race was run at a fast pace, the first 5f was more than two seconds faster than in the big handicap run over the straight track half an hour beforehand.

Palace Pier and Alpine Star maintained a similar pace right to the line by which time their rivals were tiring fast and dropping away.

Even for the first two the fastest part of their race came between 3f and 2f from the finish.

Palace Pier’s performance suggests he will be able to stay further than a mile, while Alpine Star clearly enjoyed the ground and had already shown enough stamina to go so close to winning the Prix de Diane.

There may be some questions to be raised over the standard of horses trained in France at the moment, but none whatsoever about the quality of the best French races.

Fancy Blue, Alpine Star and Raabihah, the first, second and fourth in the Diane, have all shown even better form on their subsequent starts with the Sea The Stars filly Raabihah winning a Group 3 in Deauville in style at the beginning of August.

Palace Pier is Kingman’s best son to date and Juddmonte’s sire’s second crop of threeyear-olds has further enhanced his overall reputation.

Kingman stood at only £55,000 for his first four seasons and his first crop of 111 foals included 23 Group/stakes performers and five Group winners, his second crop of 105

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Highly interesting Ammerland yearlings from the internationally proven top families of BALTIC BARONESS and LOPE DE VEGA

euro racing foals has already, in this shortened season, produced 16 black-type performers and seven Group winners, including Palace Pier.

Palace Pier is out of the unraced Nayef mare Beach Frolic and so joins a growing group of top horses by Kingman out of mares from the Mr. Prospector line which includes Headman, Domestic Spending, Calyx, Sangarius, Alocasia and Fearless King.

John Warren bought his third dam Miss d’Ouilly from Jean Luc Lagardère’s Haras d’Ouilly in Deauville in 2000 for Highclere and Guy Roxburghe’s Floors Stud.

She had won a Listed race over 1m1f at Evry and was a half-sister to Miss Satamix, who won the Jacques Le Marois for Lagardère in 1995. It has taken some time but Palace Pier has returned the family to success at the highest level.

Jockey-Club strength in depth

If the form of the Diane is looking good a month later the Prix du Jockey-Club looks even better.

The first three reappeared in the Group 2 Prix Guillaume d’Ornano over 1m2f in Deauville and once again Prince Faisal’s Mishriff, trained by Gosden, proved to be better than The Summit and Victor Ludorum.

This was a strange race run at a very slow pace and like most of those on the round course during the Jacques Le Marois weekend the small field raced on the far side of the track on the back straight, and so must have

covered more than 1m2f in total.

The first 5f was run nearly four seconds slower than the three-year-old Listed race run over the same course the following day, also on the far side down the back straight, but once they started racing, Mishriff was always on top of his old rivals.

The son of Make Believe has plenty of speed for horse who stays 1m2f.

That Listed race in question was won by Hurricane Dream, Team Valor’s Hurricane Cat colt who had been ninth in the JockeyClub. He narrowly beat the Jockey-Club fourth Dawn Intello.

The Group 2 Prix Hocquart, run this year over 1m4f in Deauville at the beginning of the meeting, was won well by the Le Havre colt Port Guillaume, fifth in the Jockey-Club, with the sixth Pao Alto behind him in third.

The Jockey-Club eighth Fantastic Spirit won a conditions race on Jacques le Marois day.

Port Guillaume will be one of the leading French-trained contenders in the Group 1 Grand Prix de Paris, to be run this year at ParisLongchamp in September, while Mishriff is heading for the Irish Champion Stakes (G1).

Space Blues: continues to improve

Space Blues provided Godolphin, Charlie Appleby and Dubawi with another Group 1 winner when the four-year-old came from well off the pace to win the Group 1 Prix

Mishriff: the Group 1-winning son of Make Believe shows “great speed” for a horse who gets 1m2f

Maurice de Gheest by three-quarters of a length from Hello Youmzain with Lope Y Fernandez and Earthlight close up behind.

The race was run during a heatwave and before the rain returned to Normandy.

Despite watering the ground was on the fast side and the winner put up one of the best splits of the meeting racing from the 2f to 1f pole in 10.76s at 43 mph.

Space Blues is unbeaten in four starts since the European Flat season began and has looked better with each run.

He is out of the Noverre mare Miss Lucifer who won the Group 2 Challenge Stakes over 7f.

His third dam is a full-sister to High Hawk, the dam of In The Wings, and he joins the impressive list of top horses by Dubawi who are inbred to the Derby winner Shirley Heights. It is a role-call that includes Al Kazeem, Arabian Queen, Coronet, Hunters Light, Journey, Left Hand, Old Persian, Sobetsu, Too Darn Hot, Wild Ilusion, Wuheido, and now Space Blues.

Fabre relies on the lightly raced types

André Fabre has not, it is safe to assume, been enjoying Deauville this year.

Persian King was never going in the Jacques Le Marois, Victor Ludorum didn’t settle in the Guillaume d’Ornano and Earthlight was never quite on terms with the leaders in the Maurice de Gheest.

His stable, though, did provide some lightly raced horses with big futures early on in the meeting.

Baltic Gold, a Gestüt Ammerland homebred son of Golden Horn and the Group 1 winner Baltic Baroness, remains unbeaten after winning a conditions race over 1m4f, sprinting through impressive finishing splits with PC Boudot looking between his long legs.

The son of the Prix Vermeille winner, whose third dam is the great Borgia, is likely to go for the Grand Prix de Paris next.

Two-year-old winners for Fabre and Japan

Fabre saddled two of the better-looking two-year-olds of the month – the Group 3 Prix Six Perfections winner, the Kendargent filly See The Rose, and the Juddmonte-owned Frankel filly Petricor, who won the Prix les Ammonites, usually the best unraced maiden of the season.

Petricor is the first foal of the Dansili mare Ruscombe, who was a useful winner herself and is a half-sister to the top stayers

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29

euro racing Sea Moon and Brian Boru.

The colt’s equivalent, the Prix de Crevecoeur, was won by the Wootton Bassett colt Midlife Crisis in a faster overall time than the fillies’ race, even if the two winners ran almost identical times for the last 2f of their respective races.

Midlife Crisis was a first European winner in the colours of the Japanese owner Shigeo Nomura and is trained by Hiroo Shimizu at Chantilly.

Bought for €120,000 at Arqana August from the Haras d’Etreham, Midlife Crisis is

out of the Australian-bred mare The Hunt Is On. His fourth dam Featherhill was a top mare in France and the US in the 1980s and produced the Etreham stallion Groom Dancer.

Wonderful Tonight wins for Menuisier

Trainer David Menuisier, the Frenchman based in Pulborough in Britain, was another British-based trainer to win a Group race in Deauville with a three-year-old when the Le Havre filly Wonderful Tonight made all

the running to win a high-class running of the Group 3 Prix Minerve over 1m4f for owner Chris Wright.

Wonderful Tonight reversed earlier form with the Aga Khan’s Valia on softer ground and is likely to make her next start in a Group 1 at ParisLongchamp.

Le Havre’s three-year-olds have been slow to get going in 2020, but in Vaucelles, the winner of the Group 2 Prix de Malleret in July, Port Guillaume and Wonderful Tonight, Monfort and Preaux’s stallion has had three high-class Group winners in a month.

European tour for Dettori and Gosden reaps Group 1 rewards in Germany GOSDEN AND DETTORI started August winning another valuable race together when Westerberg’s Miss Yoda made all the running to win the Group 1 Preis der Diana at Dusseldorf.

Dettori controlled the race from the front and, even if the Sea The Stars filly floated a little at the beginning of the straight, they stayed on well to the line to win by three-quarters of a length and a nose from the German fillies Zamrud and Virginia Joy. The second and third had contested the finish to the major domestic trial, and the Jessica Harrington-trained Silence Please was fourth, suggesting this was a high-class performance from the winner.

Miss Yoda was bred by Gestüt Etzean and was the top-priced filly at the 2018 BBAG September Sale.

Two weeks later the Group 1 1m4f Europa Preis was run in Cologne, moved due to COVID from its usual date in September.

The British-trained Dame Malliot and Barney Roy were the two favourites, but were upstaged by the German-trained outsiders Donjah and Kaspar.

The four-year-old filly Donjah managed to get her head in front of the three-year-old colt Kaspar in the very last stride.

Donjah is a Teofilo filly owned by Darius Racing who bought her from Gestüt Karlshof for €100,000 at the 2017 BBAG September Sale.

She had looked like a potential top filly when winning both her starts for trainer Henk Grewe, including a Group 3, at two but didn’t reappear at three until the Preis der Diana in which she finished sixth on her seasonal reappearance.

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It takes time for any horse to make up for so many months on the sidelines, and if Donjah succeeded in winning a Group 2 in Italy and finishing Group 1-placed twice in Germany, she looks to be better as a fouryear-old.

Kaspar is a Gestüt Rottgen home-bred

by Pivotal. He was not sold at €140,000 at the BBAG September Sale, and is now the third Group 1 performer produced by his talented dam Kastila, already the

dam of Kassiano and Kasalla.

He, too, seems to be progressing as, after breaking his maiden in May, he finished fifth in the Group 2 Union Rennen, fourth and later placed third in the Deutsches Derby (G1) and stepped up again in Cologne.

He is another potential contender for the Grand Prix de Paris, also the target for the Gestüt Schlenderhan-owned a Deutsches Derby winner In Swoop.

Miss Yoda: a top-priced filly, and a €280,000 BBAG Sale purchase by Blandford Bloodstock in 2018

POSTPONED is the record-breaking

Champion son of Dubawi who won four G1s and was higher rated than Night Of Thunder.

First yearlings selling now — and lightning actually can strike twice.

Darley

stallion stats Leading sires in Europe 2020: (by prize-money earned to August 18, 2020) Stallion

Breeding

Galileo Sea The Stars Siyouni Dark Angel Dubawi Kodiac Kingman Shamardal Lope de Vega Camelot Invincible Spirit Zoffany Le Havre Wootton Bassett Kendargent Sea The Moon Make Believe Frankel Dandy Man Night of Thunder Nathaniel Teofilo Charm Spirit Showcasing Holy Roman Emperor Rajsaman Acclamation Dream Ahead Australia Exceed And Excel Champs Elysees Mastercraftsman Dabirsim Excelebration Makfi Authorized Anodin Footstepsinthesand Oasis Dream Poet’s Voice Bated Breath Elusive City Adlerflug Pivotal Dansili Zebedee Soldier Hollow Toronado

Sadler’s Wells-Urban Sea (Miswaki) 2002 Cape Cross-Urban Sea (Miswaki) 2010 Pivotal-Sichilla (Danehill) 2011 Acclamation-Midnight Angel (Machiavellian) 2008 Dubai Millennium-Zomaradah (Deploy) 2006 Danehill-Rafha (Kris) 2007 Invincible Spirit-Zenda (Zamindar) 2015 Giant’s Causeway-Helsinki (Machiavellian) 2005 Shamardal-Lady Vettori (Vettori) 2011 Montjeu-Tarfah (Kingmambo) 2014 Green Desert-Rafha (Kris) 2003 Dansili-Tyranny (Machiavellian) 2012 Noverre-Marie Rheinberg (Surako) 2010 Iffraaj-Balladonia (Primo Dominie) 2012 Kendor-Pax Bella (Linamix) 2008 Sea The Stars-Sanwa (Monsun) 2015 Makfi-Rosie’s Posy (Suave Dancer) 2016 Galileo-Kind (Danehill) 2013 Mozart-Lady Alexander (Night Shift) 2010 Dubawi-Forest Storm (Galileo) 2016 Galileo-Magnificient Style (Silver Hawk) 2013 Galileo-Speirbhean (Danehill) 2008 Invincible Spirit-L’Enjoleuse (Montjeu) 2015 Oasis Dream-Arabesque (Zafonic) 2011 Danehill-L’On Vite (Secretariat) 2007 Linamix-Rose Quartz (Lammtarra) 2013 Royal Applause-Princess Athena (Ahonoora) 2004 Diktat-Land of Dreams (Cadeaux Genereux) 2012 Galileo-Ouija Board (Cape Cross) 2015 Danehill-Patrona (Lomond) 2005 Danehill-Hasili (Kahyasi) 2010 Danehill Dancer-Starlight Dreams (Black Tie Affair) 2010 Hat Trick-Rumored (Royal Academy) 2014 Exceed And Excel-Sun Shower (Indian Ridge) 2013 Dubawi-Dhelaal (Green Desert) 2011 Montjeu-Funsie (Saumarez) 2007 Anabaa-Born Gold (Blushing Groom) 2015 Giant’s Causeway-Glatisant (Rainbow Quest) 2006 Green Desert-Hope (Dancing Brave) 2004 Dubawi-Bright Tiara (Chief’s Crown) 2012 Dansili-Tantina (Distant View) 2013 Elusive Quality-Star of Paris (Dayjur) 2005 In the Wings-Aiyana (Last Tycoon) 2010 Polar Falcon-Fearless Revival (Cozzene) 1997 Danehill-Hasili (Kahyasi) 2001 Invincible Spirit-Cozy Maria (Cozzene) 2011 In the Wings-Island Race (Common Grounds) 2008 High Chaparral-Wana Doo (Grand Slam) 2015

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To Stud

Courtesy of Weatherbys Rnrs

Runs

177 455 150 408 221 689 280 969 158 393 335 1115 135 316 129 402 222 633 169 487 184 589 255 792 143 449 104 344 151 639 81 234 59 186 120 270 246 905 86 241 136 395 122 334 138 496 168 558 141 529 160 645 175 607 127 440 112 309 171 574 108 342 157 495 156 524 99 379 114 439 65 194 91 351 175 575 159 546 147 522 160 494 102 455 47 143 79 247 104 319 161 605 115 392 113 351

Wnrs 52 49 73 82 60 97 45 39 68 49 59 75 46 26 53 32 22 42 67 39 46 28 40 52 49 40 51 36 32 49 26 48 34 33 42 14 28 46 44 38 41 27 10 23 32 52 40 38

Wins 71 66 94 107 78 122 53 51 96 59 78 97 64 32 74 36 28 55 83 47 61 41 57 67 59 54 63 47 43 65 33 60 45 46 54 18 38 58 63 49 59 42 14 34 38 63 59 47

Wnrs/Rnrs% SWnrs SWs 29.37 32.66 33.03 29.28 37.97 28.95 33.33 30.23 30.63 28.99 32.06 29.41 32.16 25.00 35.09 39.50 37.28 35.00 27.23 45.34 33.82 22.95 28.98 30.95 34.75 25.00 29.14 28.34 28.57 28.65 24.07 30.57 21.79 33.33 36.84 21.53 30.76 26.28 27.67 25.85 25.62 26.47 21.27 29.11 30.76 32.29 34.78 33.62

20 11 4 8 8 7 8 9 7 8 4 3 5 6 5 7 2 7 1 7 4 8 3 2 4 0 3 2 5 2 5 4 1 3 0 1 2 5 1 4 1 1 2 2 3 1 6 1

£

23 3,558,564 15 1,643,866 4 1,554,282 9 1,513,336 13 1,449,491 8 1,399,344 10 1,341,500 10 1,336,119 8 1,265,339 9 1,127,990 8 1,085,406 3 1,078,374 5 1,070,457 6 1,061,101 6 1,057,797 8 973,562 4 899,104 8 879,555 2 834,775 8 819,095 5 813,924 10 801,737 4 796,050 3 757,795 4 745,534 0 737,590 3 734,789 2 734,747 5 730,010 2 720,878 6 719,891 4 719,746 1 708,023 6 705,810 0 692,253 2 691,354 2 680,577 5 653,472 1 646,396 4 642,630 1 628,071 1 620,612 2 588,977 2 571,904 4 568,564 1 565,190 7 564,192 2 554,659

GALILEO GOLD Classic winner in the 2000 Guineas Gr.1 & Royal Ascot Gr.1 winner Group 2 winning 2-year-old

ZELZAL

ECTOT

AL WUKAIR BRAMETOT

Sea The Stars’ fastest Gr.1 winner Chantilly Racecourse track record holder over the mile

Gr.1 winning 2-year-old from the Montjeu sire line

Prix Jacques-le-Marois Gr.1 winner at 3, like Dubawi & Kingman before him

The only horse to complete the French Guineas & Derby double since Shamardal & Lope De Vega

First

YEARLINGS IN 2020 AL SHAQAB RACING

. www.alshaqabracing.com

Presented by

stallion stats Leading sires of two-year-olds in Europe 2020: (by prize-money earned to August 18, 2020) Stallion

Breeding

Kodiac Mehmas Dandy Man Starspangledbanner Goken Acclamation Zoffany Siyouni Lope de Vega Toronado Gutaifan Dark Angel Territories Power Adaay Prince of Lir Twilight Son Clodovil Galileo War Front Sir Prancealot Charm Spirit Kendargent Exceed And Excel Wootton Bassett Dabirsim Kheleyf Frankel Night of Thunder Myboycharlie Showcasing Shalaa Lawman Arcano Buratino No Nay Never Helmet Belardo Kingman Anjaal Penny’s Picnic Galiway Iffraaj Kodi Bear Dubawi Fast Company Bated Breath New Bay

Danehill-Rafha (Kris) 2007 Acclamation-Lucina (Machiavellian) 2017 Mozart-Lady Alexander (Night Shift) 2010 Choisir-Gold Anthem (Made of Gold) 2011 Kendargent-Gooseley Chope (Indian Rocket) 2017 Royal Applause-Princess Athena (Ahonoora) 2004 Dansili-Tyranny (Machiavellian) 2012 Pivotal-Sichilla (Danehill) 2011 Shamardal-Lady Vettori (Vettori) 2011 High Chaparral-Wana Doo, by Grand Slam) 2015 Dark Angel-Alikhlas (Lahib) 2016 Acclamation-Midnight Angel (Machiavellian) 2008 Invincible Spirit-Taranto (Machiavellian) 2017 Oasis Dream-Frappe (Inchinor) 2013 Kodiac-Lady Lucia (Royal Applause) 2017 Kodiac-Esuvia (Whipper) 2017 Kyllachy-Twilight Mistress (Bin Ajwaad) 2017 Danehill-Clodora (Linamix) 2004 Sadler’s Wells-Urban Sea (Miswaki) 2002 Danzig-Starry Dreamer (Rubiano) 2007 Tamayuz-Mona Em (Catrail) 2013 Invincible Spirit-L’Enjoleuse (Montjeu) 2015 Kendor-Pax Bella (Linamix) 2008 Danehill-Patrona (Lomond) 2005 Iffraaj-Balladonia (Primo Dominie) 2012 Hat Trick-Rumored (Royal Academy) 2014 Green Desert-Society Lady (Mr. Prospector) 2005 Galileo-Kind (Danehill) 2013 Dubawi-Forest Storm (Galileo) 2016 Danetime-Dulceata (Rousillon) 2010 Oasis Dream-Arabesque (Zafonic) 2011 Invincible Spirit-Ghurra (War Chant) 2017 Invincible Spirit-Laramie (Gulch) 2008 Oasis Dream-Tariysha (Daylami) 2011 Exceed And Excel-Bergamask (Kingmambo) 2017 Scat Daddy-Cat’s Eye Witness (Elusive Quality) 2015 Exceed And Excel-Accessories (Singspiel) 2013 Lope de Vega-Danaskaya (Danehill) 2017 Invincible Spirit-Zenda (Zamindar) 2015 Bahamian Bounty-Ballymore Celebre (Peintre Celebre) 2016 Kheleyf-Zerky (Kingmambo) 2014 Galileo-Danzigaway (Danehill) 2016 Zafonic-Pastorale (Nureyev) 2007 Kodiac-Hawattef (Mujtahid) 2017 Dubai Millennium-Zomaradah (Deploy) 2006 Danehill Dancer-Sheezalady (Zafonic) 2011 Dansili-Tantina (Distant View) 2013 Dubawi-Cinnamon Bay (Zamindar) 2017

34

www.internationalthoroughbred.net

To Stud

Rnrs 80 64 50 24 20 39 45 33 25 20 40 49 35 10 40 23 36 7 29 7 20 33 15 28 18 25 11 27 15 20 36 31 20 11 28 22 25 24 20 16 16 7 24 26 22 25 18 14

Runs 193 162 122 64 63 92 82 64 36 39 108 109 65 22 96 57 82 23 52 18 52 84 33 56 25 59 40 41 33 51 80 50 42 27 72 49 56 49 39 37 40 19 44 57 37 52 41 33

Courtesy of Weatherbys Wnrs

Wins

28 20 10 7 11 10 13 10 2 10 11 12 9 4 11 5 8 3 4 3 7 6 5 8 6 6 4 9 9 4 8 5 5 6 4 7 5 7 8 5 5 2 5 5 7 5 5 7

32 28 14 9 14 14 13 13 3 12 11 14 10 7 14 6 10 9 5 5 9 7 7 9 8 6 6 9 10 4 8 5 6 7 5 8 6 8 8 9 6 5 7 8 8 6 8 8

Wnrs/Rnrs% SWnrs SWs 35.00 31.25 20.00 29.16 55.00 25.64 28.88 30.30 80.00 50.00 27.50 24.48 25.71 40.00 27.50 21.73 22.22 42.85 13.79 42.85 35.00 18.18 33.33 28.57 33.33 24.00 36.36 33.33 60.00 20.00 22.22 16.12 25.00 54.54 14.28 31.81 20.00 29.16 40.00 31.25 31.25 28.57 20.83 19.23 31.81 20.00 27.77 50.00

5 2 1 2 1 2 2 0 1 1 2 1 0 2 0 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0

£

6 403,532 2 250,577 2 239,530 2 224,691 2 223,017 2 213,743 2 182,678 0 164,903 1 161,373 2 152,902 2 146,360 1 143,080 0 136,012 3 133,546 0 124,829 1 120,097 1 119,148 2 114,852 1 108,425 3 107,227 1 104,760 1 104,501 1 100,874 0 100,647 1 94,340 0 93,480 0 91,065 0 90,745 0 89,465 0 89,451 0 87,807 0 84,670 0 84,414 1 82,962 0 82,762 0 79,459 0 79,142 0 78,412 0 77,944 0 76,110 0 75,915 1 75,566 0 74,468 0 73,718 1 73,197 0 73,041 1 72,917 0 72,435

DEAUVILLE SELECT SALE 9-11 SEPTEMBER DEAUVILLE

© Z.Lupa - Scoopdyga

Some dates can’t be missed!

NEW DAT E

492 selected yearlings including 22 siblings to Gr.1 winners such as WATCH ME, impressive winner of the 2020 Prix Rothschild (Gr.1), MAGIC WAND, DREAM AND DO, TREVE, SISTERCHARLIE, SOTTSASS, UNI, POLYDREAM, ADDEYBB, AL WUKAIR etc.

CONTACT info@arqana.com +33 (0)2 31 81 81 00 www.arqana.com

stallion stats Leading European first-season sires 2020: (by prize-money earned to August 18, 2020) Stallion

Breeding

Mehmas Goken Territories Adaay Prince of Lir Twilight Son Shalaa Buratino Belardo Kodi Bear New Bay Coulsty Bobby’s Kitten Dariyan Air Force Blue Awtaad The Gurkha Morandi Markaz Estidhkaar Vadamos Charming Thought Pride Of Dubai The Last Lion Scissor Kick Martinborough Fascinating Rock Ajaya Strath Burn Samysilver Marcel Flintshire Plantation Kid Pearl Secret The Great Spirit Swipe Harzand Biraaj Exosphere Protectionist Cannock Chase Uppercut Action Tamarkuz Eagle Top Bow Creek Spoil the Fun Ito Parish Hall

Acclamation-Lucina (Machiavellian) 2017 64 162 20 Kendargent-Gooseley Chope (Indian Rocket) 2017 20 63 11 Invincible Spirit-Taranto (Machiavellian) 2017 35 65 9 Kodiac-Lady Lucia (Royal Applause) 2017 40 96 11 Kodiac-Esuvia (Whipper) 2017 23 57 5 Kyllachy-Twilight Mistress (Bin Ajwaad) 2017 36 82 8 Invincible Spirit-Ghurra (War Chant) 2017 31 50 5 Exceed And Excel-Bergamask (Kingmambo) 2017 28 72 4 Lope de Vega-Danaskaya (Danehill) 2017 24 49 7 Kodiac-Hawattef (Mujtahid) 2017 26 57 5 Dubawi-Cinnamon Bay (Zamindar) 2017 14 33 7 Kodiac-Hazium (In the Wings) 2017 14 32 5 Kitten’s Joy-Celestial Woods (Forestry) 2017 21 53 4 Shamardal-Daryakana (Selkirk) 2017 10 26 2 War Front-Chatham, by Maria’s Mon) 2017 8 24 2 Cape Cross-Asheerah (Shamardal) 2017 22 36 2 Galileo-Chintz (Danehill Dancer) 2017 22 37 4 Holy Roman Emperor-Vezina (Bering) 2017 7 21 2 Dark Angel-Folga (Atraf) 2017 24 60 4 Dark Angel-Danetime Out (Danetime) 2017 19 39 6 Monsun-Celebre Vadala (Peintre Celebre) 2017 19 47 5 Oasis Dream-Annabelle’s Charm (Indian Ridge) 2017 12 30 4 Street Cry-Al Anood (Danehill) 2017 10 18 2 Choisir-Mala Mala (Brief Truce) 2017 15 38 3 Redoute’s Choice-Back Pass (Quest for Fame) 2017 10 19 0 Deep Impact-Halwa Song (Nureyev) 2017 8 15 1 Fastnet Rock-Miss Polaris (Polar Falcon) 2017 8 21 2 Invincible Spirit-Nessina (Hennessy) 2017 8 14 2 Equiano-Irish Light (Irish River) 2017 3 6 2 Indian Charlie-Hidden Ransom (Silver Ghost) 2017 3 10 3 Lawman-Mauresmo (Marju) 2017 4 11 1 Dansili-Dance Routine (Sadler’s Wells) 2017 4 10 0 Storm Boy-Unitaire (Vettori) 2017 1 5 1 Compton Place-Our Little Secret (Rossini) 2017 12 28 1 Anabaa Blue-Lavayssiere (Sicyos) 2017 1 5 0 Birdstone-Avalanche Lily (Grand Slam) 2017 5 7 1 Sea The Stars-Hazariya (Xaar) 2017 7 10 1 Iffraaj-Annie The Doc (Nayef) 2017 4 14 0 Lonhro-Altitude (Danzero) 2017 4 9 0 Monsun-Patineuse (Peintre Celebre) 2017 2 2 0 Lemon Drop Kid-Lynnwood Chase (Horse Chestnut) 2017 7 14 1 Statue of Liberty-Pep’n Chilli (Diaghlyphard) 2017 1 2 1 Speightstown-Without You Babe (Lemon Drop Kid) 2017 1 3 0 Pivotal-Gull Wing (In the Wings) 2017 2 5 0 Shamardal-Beneventa (Most Welcome) 2017 2 4 1 Rock of Gibraltar-Avezia (Night Shift) 2017 1 1 0 Adlerflug-Iota (Tiger Hill) 2017 2 2 0 Teofilo-Halla Siamsa (Montjeu) 2017 1 1 0

36

www.internationalthoroughbred.net

To Stud

Rnrs

Courtesy of Weatherbys Runs

Wnrs

Wins

Wnrs/Rnrs% SWnrs SWs

28 31.25 14 55.00 10 25.71 14 27.50 6 21.73 10 22.22 5 16.12 5 14.28 8 29.16 8 19.23 8 50.00 8 35.71 6 19.04 3 20.00 3 25.00 2 9.09 4 18.18 3 28.57 5 16.66 6 31.57 7 26.31 4 33.33 3 20.00 3 20.00 0 0.00 1 12.50 2 25.00 2 25.00 3 66.66 3 100.00 1 25.00 0 0.00 3 100.00 1 8.33 0 0.00 1 20.00 1 14.28 0 0.00 0 0.00 0 0.00 1 14.28 1 100.00 0 0.00 0 0.00 1 50.00 0 0.00 0 0.00 0 0.00

2 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

£

2 250,577 2 223,017 0 136,012 0 124,829 1 120,097 1 119,148 0 84,670 0 82,762 0 78,412 0 73,718 0 72,435 1 57,805 0 55,780 0 54,255 0 53,666 0 49,517 0 45,104 0 43,685 0 42,073 0 41,258 0 36,856 0 34,118 1 30,932 0 28,359 0 27,136 0 22,884 0 17,467 0 16,166 0 15,375 0 15,018 0 12,223 0 10,408 0 9,968 0 9,869 0 8,075 0 6,944 0 6,789 0 6,687 0 6,439 0 5,086 0 4,320 0 4,140 0 3,752 0 3,044 0 2,239 0 798 0 273 0 259

FIND YOUR NEXT STAKES WINNER AT GOFFS UK PREMIER YEARLING SALE Tuesday 1st & Wednesday 2nd September Group 1 winning graduates sold since 2015 include ADVERTISE, LAURENS, HARRY ANGEL, BARNEY ROY & GOLDEN HORDE winners of 15 Group 1 races between them

59 Stakes winning graduates in the last five years, winners of 90 Stakes races in total

HARRY ANGEL £44,000

2019 sale has already produced 9 Stakes winners purchased for less than £100,000

ADVERTISE £60,000

LAURENS £220,000

Consecutive ROYAL ASCOT success Gr.1 Commonwealth Cup 2019 - ADVERTISE 2020 - GOLDEN HORDE Gr.2 Norfolk Stakes 2019 - A'ALI 2020 - THE LIR JET Of the 19 breeze up pinhooks that made a profit of over £100,000 this year, Goffs UK’s Premier Yearling Sale was the source of TWICE as many as any other European sale

Should you require assistance ahead of this sale, please contact: Minty Farquhar +44 (0) 7493 869 240 mfarquhar@greatbritishracing.com

BARNEY ROY £70,000

GOLDEN HORDE £65,000

GBRI is the British horse racing industry’s designated first point of contact for overseas individuals interested in becoming part of the world’s leading racing and bloodstock industry. greatbritishracinginternational.com

sales preview

has had two how

Late changes The Arqana Select Sale moves forward to September 9-11 in response to the British government’s quarantine rulings for travellers from France. We chat to three European auction house directors regarding their upcoming yearling sales

I

T HAS BEEN THE YEAR OF bloodstock disruption. Despite plans for the yearling sales dates seemingly sorted by the end of the spring and an across-Europe plan to co-ordinate this autumn’s sale schedules, through August change was in the air again. This was due to UK government quarantine rulings for travellers from France and Irish government restrictions amid fears of increased numbers of COVID-19 cases.

In response, the Arqana Select Sale has moved forward from its original rearranged date of September 26-28 to September 9-11.

As we went to press, also under possible discussion was the location of the Goffs Orby Sale, which could be staged in Britain at the organisation’s Goffs UK Doncaster ground instead of Naas in Ireland. Further, the Tattersalls Ireland September Sale was also being touted as a candidate to emigrate to the UK, with the possibility of moving to Park Paddocks in Newmarket.

One thing that this disruptive period has shown us is that this industry can adapt, work

38

www.internationalthoroughbred.net

“We are all competitors on a day-to-day basis, and want to see success for our countries... but we are competitors, not enemies together and is prepared to look at all options to ensure that it can carry on trading, rolling forward and maintaining cash flows.

Freddy Powell, Arqana’s executive director says: “We are all competitors on a day-to-

day basis, and want to see success for horses produced in our own countries, but we are competitors, not enemies.”

In the spring, Arqana’s Select Sale made its first move, from its usual August date to late September. This was under the advice of the local officials, who were aware that holding a horse sale in Deauville on a bank holiday slot was going to add numbers of people to the town it would rather not have in the current circumstances.

The date of September 24 was chosen for logistical international bloodstock industry reasons, particularly important for a sale that has in recent years focused on developing its global appeal.

“We talked with the other sale companies in Europe and thought that, if international people can journey, travelling only once to Europe for yearling sales would make much sense,” says Powell.

“We felt that the international buyers could finish with the first week of Keeneland, they could travel then to Arqana, onto Goffs, Arc weekend, Book 1 and Book 2 in one go rather

sales preview

Last year’s Arqana August Yearling Sale: this year’s Select Sale date changes and will be run under social distancing protocols, wever Arqana has put together a strong international catalogue

for the first time as far back as last year for a showjumping sale, while Arqana is helping its consignors with pre-sale marketing as much as it possibly can.

“For the Select Sale we started filming the horses on farms in August, every single horse will have their conformation taken, some will have it done twice, if the vendor wants it,” outlines Powell. “We had agents travelling through Normandy looking at yearlings in good time.

“Further, if anyone wants assistance we are very happy to help, we have young people in the office happy to drive around Normandy to look at horses under the correct protocols.

“We also recommended that vendors started their prep early so that horses were ready to be seen for people who were on the tour around the farms between the Marois and the Morny.”

For those who are able to get to Normandy Arqana’s executive director, Freddy Powell

than go back and forth as they usually do.”

August has seen those well thought-out cross-sale plans disrupted again, but Arqana has been prepared, as much as it could in the circumstances of COVID-19.

The company reacted positively to help those international buyers with their autumn travel plans and the sale is now to start on September 9.

“The catalogue for the Select Sale is of outstanding quality and we are committed to providing these exceptional young horses with the best possible marketplace,” said Powell.

“This requires holding the sale at a time that maximises the chances for French and international buyers to be on attendance in Deauville.

“We wish to pay tribute to the reactivity and adaptability of all our vendors, who have immediately thrown their support behind this unusual change.”

For those unable to travel, the online bidding platform is set up and was used

and to the sales ground, the Arqana office will help with accommodation plans, while it is also considering chartering flights direct to Deauville reducing the need to travel through the busy hubs at Paris.

As for the catalogue itself, Powell is delighted with how it has come together, despite the difficulties endured during the spring when inspections were undertaken and sales plans were being made.

“We are delighted and it actually features the best of August and October in the same catalogue.

“When we printed, a lot of people came back to us and said actually in France you have such a high number of high-class pedigrees!” smiles Powell.

“On that front it was positive, but putting the catalogue together was a little frantic.

“Though it had the merit of keeping us busy through lockdown, trying to see the horses, find the dates; everything was difficult.

“But we got there, and it was thanks to our team who is dedicated and were very focused when obviously things were not easy at home – many have young families and were home schooling. It was all a bit crazy, but everyone found the time and managed to see the horses.”

C

ORONVIRUS OR NOT, August Sale or September Sale, an internationally themed catalogue is once again evident.

“The catalogue has very strong appeal to anyone in the world, we have brothers and sisters to horses who have won in Japan, the US, Australia and Dubai and by international sires,” recalls Powell.

“I think Haras de Monceaux, which has been leading vendor at the August Sale for years, has the best bunch of horses it has ever had and includes the likes of the Dubawi half-sister to Sistercharlie and Sottsass, the first foal out of Golden Valentine by Galileo and a beautiful Galileo colt from family of Magic Wand and English King. They have proper, proper horses.

“Etreham also has a strong bunch, Alamanzor has some really lovely first yearlings, and Haras de la Perelle has a beautiful Galileo filly.

“Saint Pair is also back with strength.

Andreas Putsch always believes the August Sale is little too early for his horses, so he is supporting this sale with a lovely bunch of fillies; we are very grateful for his support.

“And, of course, John O’Connor of

www.internationalthoroughbred.net

39

sales preview Goffs UK managing director, Tim Kent

Ballylinch Stud, has a very strong draft, including the Frankel half-brother to Al Wukair, and the Lope De Vega’s half-sister to See The Rose, who could be very best two-year-old in France. She has been very impressive and we sold her last year for John, who had bought the dam carrying her at our December Sale.”

The sale is to take place on three days with the first two days due to start at 2pm and with 130 lots catalogued each day.

The sale is graded and the third day, kicking off at 11am, is described

by Powell as more typical of a “usual Deauville third day”.

THE DONCASTER PREMIER SALE has had just the one slight date adjustment, moving back from its usual August slot to September 1-2.

Goffs UK managing director Tim Kent is another to press home how vital it has been for the sale companies to remain open to all eventualities, and to work closely with the local authorities and government guidelines.

“I think we have all shown huge flexibility,

we have worked with Arqana and Tattersalls to facilitate sales, it shows how flexible we are all being in 2020 and we’ve all got to take that attitude,” says Kent. “The reality is anything could change right up to day of the sale.

“We have just got to take a day at a time. We have looked at a different number of scenarios, but it is difficult to plan when you don’t know what you are planning for. So we have considered every eventuality; then we can try and deal with it the way we would want.

“I have been keeping in touch with the local officials. At the moment Doncaster seems fairly safe – other towns in Yorkshire are different – but touch wood at the moment things are as they should be, let’s hope that continues.”

The company’s online platform was used by over 75 bidders at the spring’s breeze-up sale and 30 or so at the Summer Sale and will be open again for the yearlings. As with Arqana, the company is offering further help to those unable to travel.

“The online bidding has worked really well.

It is Micheal Orton’s baby, he understands it better than anyone, but we went through so many rounds of testing before the sales and other than one small glitch that we couldn’t

BBAG Yearling Sale: “feels the right decision” LAST YEAR’S BBAG Yearling Sale enjoyed enormous success, smashing its top-price record and posting an increase of almost half in the average.

Fast forward 12 months and Germany, like the rest of the world, is dealing with a pandemic that has created unprecedented upheaval in life. Many bloodstock auction houses have been forced to reschedule their sales or create new ones, but as managing director Klaus Eulenberger explains, BBAG has stuck with their original schedule.

“It wasn’t really a difficult decision, our aim was to clarify the situation as early as we could and keeping to the original date meant everyone could plan accordingly.

Three weeks out from the sale it still feels the right decision, but it is getting tricky right now to travel in Europe with restrictions introduced.”

The BBAG-chartered flight from Doncaster to Baden-Baden will take

40

to the skies again this year, adhering to social distancing guidelines.

There will be changes, as is the case with so much of life this year; there are local government regulations that have to be followed which allow for service suppliers such a vet and transport companies to be on site and 500 potential buyers will be able to attend.

Everyone who wishes to attend must be accredited and the forms are available on BBAG’s website.

Baden-Baden’s traditional party will be missing, as will the tourists and visitors who mingle at the unique European yearling sale, but what remains is a strong catalogue of high-class yearlings.

“The catalogue has lots of nice fillies and fillies from this sale have won Group 1 races this year – Miss Yoda won the Preis der Diana (G1) and Donjah led home a onetwo for German horses in the Preis von Europa (G1), important for German breeding,” he adds.

www.internationalthoroughbred.net

It was also important for the yearling Outstrip half-sister to Donjah. Named Damascene Blade, she is to be consigned at the sale by breeder Gestüt Karlshof (Lot 184).

Two more fillies with stand-out pedigrees that would adorn any sale catalogue are Gestüt Goersdorf’s Sea The Stars full-sister to champion and Group 1 sire Sea The Moon (Lot 61), and the Dubawi half-sister to champions Windstoss and Weltstar from Gestüt Röttgen (Lot 78).

“Sea The Sky is a lovely filly and I was very impressed with her when I went to see her in June,” comments Eulenberger. “It has been a number of years since we had a Dubawi yearling in the sale and this one is a very nice and athletic filly.”

Eulenberger also points to daughters of Lope De Vega as potential star lots.

Ronald Rauscher consigns a filly out of the Listed-winning Galileo mare Promesse de l’Aube (Lot 49).

All the dam’s runners are winners

and is a daughter of the Group 3 Prix Miesque winner and Group 1 Preis der Diana second White Rose.

The second daughter of Ballylinch Stud’s leading sire is Lot 183 from Gestüt Röttgen. She is a half-sister to Group 3 winner and Group 2-placed Degas from the family of Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom.

First-season sires are strongly represented and Gestüt Paschberg’s sends a colt by champion Churchill (Lot 50).

BBAG managing director, Klaus Eulenberger

sales preview

Half-sister to A’Ali: a “lovely quality filly”

Last year’s Goffs UK Premier Sale produced a record-breaker. According to Kent, the first base in this difficult year will be to aim to achieve a decent clearance rate and a healthy trade throughout

have predicted, it’s worked well,” smiles Kent.

“It has been embraced by a broad range of buyers, both overseas and domestic. People can register to bid online and we get an automatic email. We can then put interested buyers in touch with an agent or anyone willing to help on day or lead-up to sale if they are unable to attend in person.”

In a normal year it would have to suspected that Kent would have been reasonably confident going into his first Premier Sale at the helm, happy with this year’s racecourse performances of the sale graduates and the catalogue that his team has put together.

“We have had an outstanding year on the track, especially with the two-year-olds as we have had eight stakes winners already, it is one of best years on the racecourse,” he smiles ruefully.

“We spoke to a couple of Australian buyers through Tony Williams [former managing director] about coming over this year as they had seen the wonderful results we have had on the track. Sadly, they can’t even leave their state let alone their country! It is a shame we are in this scenario on the back of the year we have had.

“The graduates this year are headed up by the likes of the The Lir Jet, Supremacy, Method. The last time I checked we had four of the top eight two-year-olds on Timeform ratings, all bought for a range of prices.

“It is exciting that loyal clients keep coming back and get more success from this sale and we always work to show new buyers what they can find in Doncaster”

For this year, the pedigrees are probably led by the Starspangledbanner half-brother to Ventura Tormenta (Lot 313), the Cotai Glory half-sister to A’Ali (Lot 322) and the Dark Angel full-brother to the Group 3 winner Yafta (Lot 423).

Kent adds: “We are always having in-house debates as to what is going to top the sale! On pedigree those are some may stand out, but we have some cracking individuals and it is always those that sell best with us and prove themselves on the racecourse.

“All my colleagues have horses in the catalogue they are very bullish about – lovely horses by proper stallions.

“That is what our sale is all about – a proper racehorse by a proven stallion and that is all you need.

“It is a lovely problem to have, arguing over what is going to top the sale at this stage. Let’s hope everything that we have high hopes for can do the job.”

As to judging whether the sale itself has “done its job”, come September 3, Kent will not necessarily be looking at the usual metrics of turnover, average and medians.

“The most important aspect this year will be clearance rate,” he explains.

“On top of that a healthy and sustainable trade from start to finish, obviously looking for a few highlights between.

“We won’t be expecting fireworks or record breakers, it would be naive to think we’ll be in that scenario.

“No one will be in that situation this year.

Clearance rate will be the barometer and a healthy trade over two days.”

SALCEY FOREST STUD offers the strongest collection of yearlings in its history at this year’s sales, according to Daniel Creighton one half of the team behind the operation, alongside Josh Schwartz.

“I am very pleased with our yearling draft, we have a very nice Bungle Inthejungle colt (Lot 265) and a lovely Kodiac filly (Lot 52) going to Doncaster.

“Away from them, we have some really nice Pearl Secret yearlings, too, so there is a horse to suit everyone.”

The diamond amongst their jewels is the Premier Sale’s Lot 322, a half- sister to the high-class sprinter A’Ali from the first crop of Group 3 Molecomb Stakes winner and King’s Stand (G1) runner-up Cotai Glory.

“She is the only filly out of the mare, who we sadly lost to colic, so this is the only chance for the line to continue,” said Creighton.

“She is a lovely quality filly, who is really strong and I imagine she will stand out. She is a very fast-looking horse and a very good mover, who covers lots of ground on the lunge. She screams Royal Ascot to me.”

It’s unsurprising that the grand-daughter of Exceed And Excel should be thought of in those terms – her three-year-old Society Rock half-brother won the Group 2 Norfolk Stakes at last year’s Royal meeting and her sire was just touched off in the King’s Stand Stakes (G1) when third to Marsha and Lady Aurelia in the Nunthorpe Stakes (G1).

“I like Cotai Glory and I think that this filly is a really good advert for the sire,” he added.

This filly is also a close relation to a winner by Kodiac and out of a Motivator mare, so bred on a similar cross to the Group 1 National Stakes third Lockheed who is by Exceed And Excel.

Her dam is a half-sister to the Group 3 Darley Stakes winner and twice Group 1-placed Efisio colt Enforcer and the third dam Willowy Wood was a multiple Grade 3 winner in North America, who was also placed in the Grade 1 Mother Goose Stakes.

A’Ali

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ONCE AGAIN

IN

THE TOP 10 BREEDERS IN FRANCE A new generation to the fore!

PRETTY GORGEOUS - winner on debut, 2nd Silver Flash Stakes (Gr.3) DARKNESS - a dual winner LA GIOIOSA - winner on debut, 2nd Prix François Boutin (Gr.3) WOOTTON ASSET - already a dual winner and 4th in the Listed Prix Roland de Chambure MADOUSS - winner on debut and 5th in the Listed Criterium du Becquet STORMY POUSS - winner in Marseille and 2nd in the Listed Prix des Jouvenceaux et des Jouvencelles

THE ARQANA SELECT SALE DRAFT 24 yearlings by top sires.

All born and raised at Haras du Cadran.

HARAS DU CADRAN / Pierre Talvard : +33 (0)6 80 88 20 04 - contact@harasducadran.com - www.harasducadran.com

© Agence G / Scoopdyga

TWO-YEAR-OLD WINNERS IN 2020

golden horde Entreat, dam of Golden Horde, with this year’s Zoustar filly foal at Clara Stud, County Kilkenny

Unexpected outcomes Aisling Crowe finds out how the sale of car led to the purchase of a broodmare, the development of a stud farm and the breeding of the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup winner

E

ACH DECISION has many consequences, some intended but many more unforeseen; how could a person know when they make a simple choice the many consequences of that decision?

When pharmacist James Cloney after a spell in the UK returned to Ireland to work, his job came with a company car so he regarded his own vehicle as surplus to requirements.

He made the decision to sell that car and invest the money instead in a mare in partnership with his brother.

Over a decade later that mare’s son Dream Of Dreams ran third in the Group 1 Diamond Jubilee Stakes and won this yera’s Hungerford Stakes (G2).

She and her offspring have been sold on, but the return on that initial investment

“The majority of the mares and fillies we bought have really big back pedigrees.

You have to go back that far when you can’t afford it at the top!

allowed Cloney buy and redevelop Clara Stud in Kilkenny, and, more significantly, it provided for the purchase of a Pivotal mare named Entreat.

Now the dam of a Group 1 winner, the Pivotal mare was sold by Cheveley Park Stud to Cloney carrying to Lethal Force.

She cost the buyer just 14,000gns and that foal she was carrying is this year’s Group 1 Commonwealth Cup hero Golden Horde.

Cloney and his father-in-law Michael have put together a 16-strong broodmare band on the former show-jumping stud outside Kilkenny, largely through focusing on young mares with back pedigrees laden with blacktype, as he explains.

“The majority of the mares and fillies we bought have really big back pedigrees, looking at their third dams. You have to go back that

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golden horde far when you can’t afford it at the top!

“At least if it’s there in the third dam, or the third dam is working quite well and it’s coming down through different lines of the family, you think there has to be a chance.

“I bought quite a few of those first daughters of first daughters, so their pages looked light on top but there was plenty going on.”

Entreat is a prime example. When Cloney bought her at the Tattersalls 2016 July Sale, she’d had two runners, both placed, and two more to run for her.

Her half-brother Producer had won the Group 2 Topkapi Trophy, the Criterion Stakes and the Supreme Stakes (both G3 events) and a handful of Listed races but that was all the black-type mustered by her dam and siblings.

Entreat’s dam, however, told a much different story. In fact, this article could be taken up with a discussion of the family, such is its merits, but this is a brief resume.

River Saint was a half-sister to the great champion Serena’s Song, who proved herself a top-class broodmare after a championship

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racing career that saw her inducted into the Hall Of Fame.

Her Storm Cat daughter Sophisticat won the Group 1 Coronation Stakes and Prix Marcel Boussac for the Coolmore partners, while her Listed-winning Mr. Prospector daughter Serena’s Tune has outperformed her siblings, producing the Group 3 Greenham Stakes winner and sire Vocalised for Jim Bolger and she is the second dam of Grade 1 winner and leading young sire Honor Code.

Main picture, Golden Horde winning at Royal Ascot, and below, jockey Adam Kirby with ITV presenter Matt Chapman

S

ERENA’S SISTER, as the name implies a full-sister to the champion, has brought the family to the fore in Europe and Australia. Her daughter Princess Serena is the dam of Group 2 winner and Group 1 placed Puissance De Lune, a promising young stallion in Australia, and the Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan winner Zabeel Prince. She is also the second dam of Rizeena, successful in the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes.

“Entreat has a real champion’s back pedigree, a lot of different lines are working in different angles down through it,” says Cloney. “When I bought her, my main thing was that she looks an exposed mare, but she was not really because she had four Dutch Art coverings and only two had run.

“I thought she has only been exposed to one stallion really, and at the same time Lethal Force wasn’t very popular, but I think he is not a bad stallion in any shape or means and I was willing to take a chance. If they have too obvious of a covering, we can’t buy them so you have to take a chance on it.”

Entreat is a typical Pivotal mare, almost a replica of her sire and she throws strong, attractive foals in that mode.

When the Lethal Force colt went to GoffsUK Premier Yearling Sale in 2018, he made £65,000 to trainer Clive Cox, and Cloney returned to Kilkenny nursing hopes for the year-younger Mehmas half-brother he had at home.

A year later, and back at Doncaster with that colt, those hopes were now real with bold black-type updates on the page – Golden Horde had won the Group 2 Richmond Stakes and had just run third to Earthlight in the Group 1 Prix Morny.

Under the Highclere Stud draft – Paddy Kelly who helps Cloney and his father-inlaw on the farm and preps the sales horses,

works for Highclere Stud – Entreat’s yearling Mehmas colt made £265,000 to Oliver St Lawrence and ended 2019 as the most expensive yearling from the first crop of his sire.

Now named Line Of Departure and in training with Roger Varian at the time of writing, he is already a dual winner.

When their Zoffany half-sister sells at Tattersalls Book 1 in October, the page that was very light on top now looks very different.

It now shows a Group 1 winner and the Listed winner Exhort, as well as winners Line Of

golden horde

Departure and Plead, and Entreat can now boast being the dam of four winners from five runners.

Of the decision to sell Entreat’s yearling daughter at Tattersalls, Cloney says: “The Zoffany filly is our first to sell in Book 1.

“We could have gone anywhere with her really, but it’s not too often that you get a horse that can go to that sale.

“Line Of Departure has won twice now and I think there is a lot of potential in him.

Golden Horde’s run in the July Cup showed he is a proper Group 1 horse and, personally,

I think a bit faster ground would have suited him.

“I’ve covered at least one mare a year with Zoffany for the last few seasons. I’d be excited about this filly, she has more of a classy appeal about her and I think she could be the true miler out of the family.

“I think that was the nice thing that Zoffany could bring to the mare, that miler class to the mare.

“I think that’s what will have greater appeal. If you race a filly you want something that you can breed out of and I think that

Zoffany will be a broodmare sire, you have it all there, and I think that is where I see the filly appealing to as, without even racing a step, she has a huge broodmare career.”

Entreat has a filly foal from the first northern-hemisphere crop of Australian sensation Zoustar, and was amongst the elite book of mares that Blue Point covered at Kildangan Stud last spring.

“From the foals I have seen Entreat has this natural gift to produce stunning stock and we are very excited about Zoustar, there’s an interesting pedigree behind the stallion, he

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golden horde was a top class juvenile and he has broken every record down under,” says Cloney.

“If you go back to it where do you get the opportunity to use a proven, but still a firstseason sire?

“Nothing had happened in the pedigree at the time, but I thought it was the right thing to do.

“She is now the dam of a Royal Ascot Group 1 winner and Blue Point is a Royal Ascot Group 1 winner so if there is ever a horse bred for the Commonwealth Cup this is him or her,” he laughs.

The Clara Stud, Paddy Kelly and Highclere Stud team will have a representative at GoffsUK’s Premier Yearling Sale this year, a Starspangledbanner colt and a first foal of the New Approach mare Appreciating. She was bred by HM The Queen out of Star Value, a gift from HH The Aga Khan as a Danehill Dancer daughter of Group 1 Prix de Diane winner Shemaka.

That makes the strong and masculine chestnut inbred 3x3 to Danehill Dancer and, despite there being no familial relationship, all concerned remark on the physical resemblance between this yearling and that of a famous previous occupant of his stable.

“He is a very similar build to Golden Horde as a yearling; a big, strong belter of a colt so we are looking forward to selling him,” it’s a view held by Kelly, who expresses it later as Line Of Departure: by Mehmas and out of Entreat. The colt, who has won his last two starts, sold for £260,000 at the GoffsUK Premier, the third-best price at last year’s sale

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“Entreat has this natural gift to produce stunning stock and we are very excited about Zoustar, there’s an interesting pedigree behind the stallion he shows the colt in the strong August sun.

“It looks quite light on the page because she was unraced – we bought her as a twoyear-old and brought her back here to rehab her, sent her into training with Kevin Ryan.

“He was adamant that she was a cracking good filly only the injury wouldn’t hold up, he thought she had loads of ability if he could get her to the track sound but unfortunately that didn’t happen.

“The good thing about that is it gives

you the confidence to cover her well; she’s a New Approach mare so we sent her to Starspangledbanner.

“Nothing has really happened yet in the family, Appreciating’s dam has only had one runner but he was rated in the 80s and it looks light because this is the first foal but that can mature out,” explains Cloney.

W

HEN CLONEY assesses a mare she has to be a daughter of a stallion that either excels as a broodmare sire or has the potential to do so in the future. The stock each mare produces have to be horses that Cloney would be willing to race himself and, especially with fillies, the identity of their dam-sire is vital.

Entreat is a daughter of Pivotal, Appreciating is by New Approach, who is the broodmare sire of Golden Horde’s old foe Earthlight, while the third yearling that Cloney offers for sale this year, a Mastercraftsman filly in Book 2, is out of the Giant’s Causeway mare Il Palazzo.

Her first foal is the stakes winner Still Standing (Mastercraftsman), and won the Listed Devoy Stakes over 1m2f last season for Jessica Harrington.

The dam follows Cloney’s formula – her dam is a half-sister to Grade 1 Clement L Hirsch Turf Championship winner Senure out of Diese, winner of the Group 3 Prix Corrida.

She is a half-sister to the Group 1 winner and sire Xaar out of Monroe so it is that branch of Best In Show’s family, with Cityscape, Bated Brath, Logician and a host of other top-class performers.

“Trying to get a nice broodmare sire, or potential broodmare sire is very important, too,”says Cloney. “Il Palazzo is a Giant’s Causeway mare, third dam is Monroe and every foal she throws is much bigger and stronger than her.

“It’s eye-opening when you see the stock, it’s really not about what the dam looks like, it’s about what she can produce and she really produces lovely foals.”

When James Cloney made that decision to sell his car and buy a mare with his brother, Golden Horde was the unforeseen consequence.

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to say now that it was, most definitely, the right decision.

arqana consignors

Selling yearlings at Arqana in September Jocelyn de Moubray chats with three consignors ahead of this year’s unique Arqana Select Sale, now due to be staged on September 9-11 • Antoine Bellanger, Arcadia Elevage • Thierry Dalla Longa, Haras de Saint Vincent • Philip Lybeck, Haras de Bourgeauville

A

NTOINE BELLANGER is already a familiar figure at the sales in Deauville, but until now he has always been wearing the grey and pink colours of the Haras des

Monceaux.

Bellanger worked for 11 years at Monceaux – he won the 2016 Godolphin Award for stud personnel while he was there and finished his time as the manager of the yearling division. This year he will be fronting his own consignment for the first time as his Arcadia Elevage has five colts and two fillies in the September catalogue.

Bellanger’s boyish looks and reserved manner serves to conceal the fact that he has spent some 15 years or more working with top-class bloodstock and, together with

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“There is a French saying that it is better to have a little place of your own than a big house belonging to someone else, and I decided it was time to pay heed!

his companion Aline Giraud, the marketing director of the Aga Khan Studs, he is set to become an important part of the new generation in French breeding.

“I felt good when I was at Monceaux,” he explains, “it is a privilege to work with such high-quality horses but part of me was not fully satisfied and I needed a new challenge to move forward to continue progressing.

“There is a French saying that it is better to have a little place of your own than a big house belonging to someone else, and I decided it was time to pay heed!”

Last year Bellanger bought an organic cattle farm at Saint-André-d’Hébertot, a small village close to Pont l’Eveque and only 35km from Deauville. The first horses arrived on the farm in November with more coming after the Arqana December Sale. Three purchased

arqana consignors

Pictures show the new farm and buildings at Arcadia Elevage, near Pont l’Eveque foals by Air Force Blue, Dark Angel and Territories will be part of the Arcadia draft for September.

By the time the 2020 breeding season started the farm was able to board and look after the 25 to 30 mares who were to come for the covering season.

Bellanger’s plan is to board mares as well as to present drafts at the sales in Deauville.

“Like a good Norman,” he laughs when pressed for his plan, “I would not want to place myself or the farm in any one category or another. I suppose I would like to become a structure of the same type as Les Monceaux, one which breeds horses who are offered for sale rather than a consignor.

“I am convinced it makes sense to move horses around as little as is possible and it is certainly an advantage to know your horses

“I suppose I would like to become a structure of the same type as Les Monceaux, one which breeds horses who are offered for sale rather than a consignor

before you start preparing them for the yearling sales.”

When it comes to sales preparation he has a clear idea of what he is trying to achieve.

“For me,” Belanger expands, “the definition of sales prep is to work out which attributes in any horse we can work on or improve.

“There are some things we can’t change, but we have to try and judge the positive and negative aspects of each individual and decide which of these we are able to change.

“We all know we want to have yearlings who walk well and have good bone and substance, but we have to judge whether or not we will be able to muscle this horse’s back or develop another one’s quarters and hind leg.”

Bellanger’s parents had a small breeding operation not far from Angers in the Loire

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CLASSIC WINNER, CLASSIC SIRE

MAKE BELIEVE.

MISHRIFF – GROUP 1 PRIX DU JOCKEY CLUB WINNER Sire of Stakes winners including:

Leading Sires of 3yos in Europe

MISHRIFF

Gr.1 Prix du Jockey Club Gr.2 Prix Guillaume d’Ornano LR Newmarket Stakes

ROSE OF KILDARE

Gr.3 Musidora Stakes Gr.3 Oh So Sharp Stakes Gr.3 First of Clyde Stakes 3rd Gr.2 German 1,000 Guineas

OCEAN FANTASY

Champion 2yo Filly in Germany Gr.3 Preis der Winterkönigin 3rd Gr.2 Diana-Trial

by prize money

Sire

2020 Fee

Total €

1

Galileo

Private

2,578,987

2

Kingman

£150,000

1,071,742

3

MAKE BELIEVE

€12,000

1,018,402

4

Wootton Bassett

€40,000

931,715

5

Sea The Stars

€150,000

901,110

6

Siyouni

€100,000

891,240

7

Night Of Thunder

€25,000

793,458

8

Shamardal

Private

763,894

statistics by stallionguide.com 18/08/20

BALLYLINCH STUD

THOMASTOWN, CO. KILKENNY

Te l : + 3 5 3 ( 0 ) 5 6 7 7 2 4 2 1 7 • i n f o @ b a l l y l i n c h s t u d . i e • w w w . b a l l y l i n c h s t u d . c o m

arqana consignors valley, where they raised both jumpers and Flat horses.

“Horses and racing were always a big part of my life,” he remembers. “My brother and I started following racing early on and we would go into the stables, went racing at weekends and were soon engrossed by the whole racing world.”

His first professional experience came while he was completing his studies at Laval and was taken on as an apprentice by Patrick Boiteau, a leading breeder of jumpers whose has produced many champions including Cyrlight, Spider Flight and Karly Fight.

“When I had finished my studies I was offered a full-time post and was tempted but something told me that it would be too easy to stay with Monsieur Boiteau and I decided to look further afield.”

He ended up leaving France for three years to work first at Derrinstown Stud in Ireland and then at Lane’s End Farm in Kentucky.

“In Ireland I did a bit of everything, both mares and yearlings and then in Kentucky I worked at the yearling division and presented horses at Keeneland.

“Lane’s End is an impressive machine, there are a lot of horses and many people there but the whole works together very well indeed.”

Amongst the horses he watched on his visits to the races at Keeneland were Naissance Royale and Coquereles, who both carried the colours of Lucien Urano who had recently bought the Haras des Monceaux and begun to invest in Flat horses.

“I don’t know why they made an impression,” he says, “but at the time I was looking for a position to return to France and when I saw an advertisement for the Haras de Monceaux I decided that’s

where I wanted to work.”

Bellanger got the job and began work in 2008. His first year at Monceaux there were only five or six yearlings who were presented at the sales by other studs. Ten years later for his last season there were more like 65 yearlings to be prepared for the sales by a team which had grown to about 15 people for the August sale.

Bellanger sounds very positive in his own little house. “I am not,” he says, “really looking for new clients as my first concern is to provide the best service for the horses I already have in my responsibility.

“We have been lucky in France this year and at the end of the day our sector has suffered less than many others.

“The breeding season was able to continue more or less as normal and our racing was able to restart early. In any event we have no choice; we have to keep going and look to the future with confidence.”

Thierry Dalla Longa, Haras de Saint Vincent There have always been plenty of horses in the south-west of France. In recent years it has been best known internationally as the region where many of France’s most successful Flat trainers are based – Jean Claude Rouget and François Rohaut in Pau,

Christophe Ferland at La Teste and Didier Guillemin, Philippe Sogorb and Xavier Thomas Demeaulte at Mont de Marsan.

It is also traditionally been where many of the best Anglo-Arabian and endurance horses are raised, two specialties in which France has excelled.

France’s Flat breeders are, on the other hand, mostly based in Normandy or the neighboring parts of north-west France and in recent years there have been few studs from the south-west represented at the sales in Deauville.

A newcomer from the south-west out to make a mark at the Arqana sales is Haras de Saint Vincent, run by Thierry Dalla Longa and his partner Ludivine Charles.

In 2017 the stud took one horse to the Arqana August Sale – a Zoffany filly they had purchased for €50,000 at the Arqana December Sale.

The filly was sold to Coolmore for €100,000, was called Fleeting and went on to be placed in the English and Irish Oaks as well as the Prix de l’Opera and the Pretty Polly Stakes.

At the following year’s sale Saint Vincent sold two more yearlings for €100,000 and in 2019 it enjoyed by far its best August sale to date selling five for a total of €730,000.

This year Saint Vincent will offer seven

The stallion Faz at Haras de Saint Vincent in the south-west of France

Photo: Zuzanna Lupa

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arqana consignors yearlings in the September sale including colts by new sires Almanzor and Churchill and a full-sister to the Group 1-winning sprinter Sands Of Mali.

Dalla Longa came to breeding from the training world.

“I always thought I would become a trainer,” he says, “and I spent 15 years working for trainers, the last eight of them with Jacques Ortet at Pau during the years when he was the top jumps trainer in France.

“However, life had other ideas and when I left Ortet I went to join my partner at the Haras de Saint Vincent.”

Saint Vincent now extends over 90 hectares on three different sites close to Lourdes, between Pau and Tarbes at 500 metres altitude in the foothills of the Pyrenees.

“When we bought the farm it had been empty for some 15 years having previously been a cattle farm. Our first idea was to provide a place where the local trainers could spell horses and to keep a few Anglo-Arabian mares.

“We began to breed horses as in the region if you wish to quality for agricultural subsidies you have to own at least five mares.

“We started with mares bought very cheaply and we would find a solution to sell their progeny privately or to make arrangements with local trainers.

“You soon learn that whether you sell your horse for €5,000 or €50,000 the cost of raising them is precisely the same.”

Since 2011 Saint Vincent has specialised in breeding and sales preparation while continuing to take horses out of training in need of a break and to stand stallions.

There are now about 30 mares based on the farm in which Dalla Longa and Charles own shares in a dozen.

T

HEY STAND three stallions, the Group-winning sprinter Fas, the Poule d’Essai des Poulains winner Lucayan and Silas Marner, who is more or less a private stallion for his owner Alain Jathiere.

“It is hard to know exactly,” Dalla Longa explains, “but I reckon there are around 800 mares based in the south-west and we have a tradition of producing speed horses.

“Fas, a Group-winning son of Fastnet Rock, covered 42 mares for this first season this year.”

If they are, of course, proud of the success of Fleeting they are above all breeders and 90 per cent of horses Saint Vincent presents for sale were bred on the farm.

“With the help of our different partners,” Dalla Longa says, “we are always trying to upgrade our stock and we look to buy one or Fleeting (left) winning the Group 2 May Hill Stakes. The daughter of Zoffany, placed in the English and Irish Oaks, was sold as a yearling

by Haras de Saint Vincent for €100,000

Saint Vincent is in the south-west, an area better known for training racehorses, but Dalla Longa reckons there are around 800 mares in the region

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arqana consignors two new mares every year.”

After a succession of excellent years 2020 has been a difficult one for Saint Vincent.

“Our own mares had mostly left to be covered before the lockdown,” Dalla Longa says, “and while the breeders association did a fantastic job to maintain the covering season we lost several mares who were due to arrive from Spain. It was no longer possible during lockdown, and when there is no racing there are fewer horses in training in need of a break.”

The immediate future is unsure, too. “We have been strong supporters of both the V2 sale in Deauville in August and of the Osarus sale at La Teste in September.

“Both have been cancelled this year and, while it is a great initiative of Osarus to combine with Arqana for a sale in October, I fear some of our horses will be pushed back into the November sale as both companies have been struggling to control the numbers of yearlings on offer.”

Despite the problems 2020 has brought to Saint Vincent and everybody else in the business Dalla Longa remains optimistic for the longer term.

“We have a great racing system in France,” he says with confidence, “and we must make sure it is maintained. I think things are going in the right direction and when I look and see the new, younger people who have taken up positions in the racing authorities I am encouraged for the future.

“We must all try to see the positive aspects

of our situation, and if we do there is no reason why we won’t succeed together.”

In the short run he is focused on preparing his yearlings for September and on the sister to Sands Of Mali.

“She comes from a family I know well and she was bred by a friend who asked us to prepare her for the sale.

“The fillies are different from the colts in the family, but I am sure she will turn out to be both precocious and fast. She is calm and cool in her daily work, but when you ask her something she responds like a horse who has speed.”

Philip Lybeck, Haras de Bourgeauville

Robert and Amelie Ehrnrooth bought the Haras de Bougeauville in the hills close to Deauville in 1992, and the Finnish couple have been part of the Normandy breeding world for a long time.

The stud has, however, evolved in recent years and is now run by Philip Lybeck, Amelie Ehrnrooth’s son and it is enjoying an excellent run on the racecourse.

In 2019, Bourgeauville came close to achieving its first French Classic victory when the Olympic Glory filly Grand Glory flew from miles off the pace to finish third in the Prix de Diane only a head and half a length behind the winner.

The Gianuca Bietolini-trained filly has maintained her progress at four winning a Listed race brilliantly at ParisLongchamp on

“... when I look and see the new, younger people who have taken up positions in the racing authorities I am encouraged for the future her reappearance and looking a little unlucky in the Group 2 Prix Corrida.

Meanwhile, the Sea The Moon colt Privilegiado completed the Norwegian Triple Crown, winning the Norsk Derby by over 15l, before finishing third to Ghaiyyath in the Group 3 in Dubai and returning to win the Group 3 Oslo Cup in June 2020.

Other recent highlights for Bourgeauvillebreds have included a Listed win at Goodwood for Lyzbeth and some promising three-year-olds in France headed by the stakes-placed filly Padovana and the colt Bois d’Argent.

“I arrived at Bourgeauville in 2004,” Philip Lybeck remembers. “At the time the farm

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arqana consignors was managed by Sylvain Vidal [who was to go on to look after Le Havre at the Haras de la Cauviniere].

“My role and the farm itself have slowly changed over the years since. I believe today we have a very good team on the farm. You can’t, after all, do anything on your own.”

L

YBECK’s wife Diane Lybeck is the owner of the pre-training establishment Ecurie Diane, which is only a few kilometers away from Bourgeauville at Reux.

“Diane and my business are very complimentary,” says Lybeck.

“At least we know where to send our horses for pre-training,” he jokes.

Lybeck is more than hopeful that Grand Glory will find the Group 1 win she deserves.

“Grand Glory went through the ring in

“My role and the farm itself have slowly changed over the years since.

I believe today we have a very good team on the farm. You can’t, after all, do anything on your own

Arqana and we bought her back before, sadly, deciding to sell her privately to Marco Bozzi for only €18,000,” he recalls. “And then, of course, her dam died after producing the three-year-old Toronado colt Bois d’Argent, who has won his only start at Chantilly.

“We do have two half-sisters to Grand Glory – Morlanda by Exceleration, who was not fast herself who has a foal by Olympic Glory and is back in-foal to the same sire.

“And we have also bought the Approve mare Aqua De Valencia. She was a tough handicapper winning six times from 40 starts.

This is a family Bourgeauville has had for a long time as my parents bought Grand Glory’s second dam Maria De La Luz as a yearling in Deauville with Luigi d’Allesandri in 1997.”

Bourgeauville’s other Classic star Privilegiado was sold as a yearling in Deauville October for €67,000.

“It would be nice to see him run in

Grand Glory: bred by Bourgeauville, the filly finished third in last year’s Prix de Diane and has picked up a Listed win and Group 2 second in 2020 Photo: APRH

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arqana consignors Grade 2 winner Minakshi, who is a half sister to the dam of Grand Glory.

“Minakshi raced for us in the US,” Lybeck explains, “and won her Grade 2 in Canada with trainer Mike Matz.

“She has been an unlucky breeder and the Almanzor colt is only the second of her progeny who will have the opportunity of going into training.”

Another of the draft is a Wootton Bassett colt out of Maiden Tower who was bred by Lybeck himself with different partners.

“Maiden Tower has,” he says, “turned out to have been an amazing buy. We bought her in-foal to Teofilo from Darley for €45,000 in Goffs and we then sold the Teofilo for

€210,000 and her Shalaa colt last year for €600,000. I thought he was a lovely colt, but never imagined he would make quite so much, although I am happy he did!”

For the time being the daily routine at Bourgeauville has not been transformed.

“Like everybody else we carried out all of the special COVID precautions,” Lybeck says, “but the breeding season was close to a normal one.

“The postponing of the sale suited us in many ways as our yearlings will benefit from the extra time before the sale.

“For the future I just hope they eventually restore prize-money in France to where it was before.”

Arqana Select Sale: Arcadia Elevage, HSV Agency, Haras de Bourgeauville Arcadia Elevage

Photo: APRH

Highly regarded Padovana (Sea The Moon)

France or Germany,” Lybeck admits, “but I don’t think it is very likely.

“They enjoy their racing at home and then if you win every time you go to the races you are going to be happy with the way things are going. He did run a great race to be third to Ghaiyyath in Dubai.”

Bourgeauville has another possible star by Sea The Moon in their own filly Padovana, who is trained by Francis Henri Graffard.

Padovana won by 4l on her debut as a three-year-old in Chantilly before finishing an excellent third in the Listed Prix de Thiberville at ParisLongchamp beaten by the highly regard Aga Khan filly Valia.

“I know Francis [Graffard] was a little disappointed to be only third, but my mother and I were thrilled. For us it would be absurd not to be if you finish third on your second start in a Listed at ParisLongchamp!”

Bourgeauville has a total of 22 yearlings in 2020 of which only three for one reason or another will not be presented at a sale.

There are six in the Arqana September sale, including a Wootton Bassett half-brother to Padovana and an Almanzor colt out of the

Lot

Detail

Sire

Dam

Dam sire

33

b,c.

Territories

Bianca De Medici

Medicean

110

g,c.

Air Force Blue

Happyness

Verglas

275

b,c.

Dark Angel

Vadariya

Sea The Stars

282

b,c.

Kodiac

Village Fete

Singspiel

389

b,c.

Invincible Spirit

Lady Tamayuz

Tamayuz

406

b,f.

Reliable Man

Mantissa

Oratorio

424

b,f.

Zarak

Naseem Alyasmeen

Clodovil

Sire

Dam

Dam sire

HSV Agency Lot

Detail

18 b,f.

Iffraaj

Anthracite

Redoute’s Choice

48

ro,c.

Almanzor

Cherifa

Rip Van Winkle

78

b,f.

Dabirsim

Elayouna

Dr Fong

190

b,f.

Exceed And Excel

Pinaruh

Iffraaj

374

b,f.

Panis

Kadiania

Indian Rocket

384

br,c.

Churchill

La Corniche

Naaqoos

453

br,c.

Territories

Run In Paris

Hurricane Run

Sire

Dam

Dam sire

13 ch,c.

Pivotal

Almerita

Medicean

145

Wootton Bassett

Maiden Tower

Groom Dancer

158 b,c.

Almanzor

Minakshi

Footstepsinthesand

171

ch,c.

Le Havre

Narnia Dawn

Roderic O’Connor

198

b,c.

Wootton Bassett

Praise Dancing

Blame

367

b,f

Al Wukair

Harvestide

Duke Of Marmalade

Haras de Bourgeauville Lot

Detail b,c.

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philippe augier Philippe Augier (left) with actor Liam Neeson, Augier in his role as mayor of Deauville at the town’s 38th American Film Festival

Looking to the future

Philippe Augier became the new president of the PMU in June, a vitally important role in the operation of French racing.

Jocelyn de Moubray chats with Augier, who has had 50 years involvement in the management of French racing and politics, regarding PMU plans after its recording-breaking turnover in July

P

HILIPPE AUGIER has been in the room where things happen in the French racing and politics for nearly 50 years. It may have seemed as if his influence in the racing world was no longer of the highest importance, even though he is a board member of France Galop and is the long-serving mayor of Deauville, one of the centres of French racing and breeding, however, COVID-19 has changed many things for many people and the pandemic created an unheralded crisis for racing all over the world.

Augier’s role in helping France Galop emerge from lockdown as early as May 11, saving millions for both the French state and the racing authorities, demonstrated the influence he is able to wield on both the French racing and political worlds.

At more or less the same time, Bertrand Meheut, the president of the PMU, unexpectedly decided to step down and so, and more or less directly, Augier found himself being put forward as a potential replacement. His appointment for a four-year term as president of PMU was confirmed by the government in June 2020.

“I do not of course know exactly how my nomination came about,” Augier explains.

“Edouard de Rothschild [the president of France Galop] called me to say Meheut had decided to step down immediately and when I pressed him on possible replacements he just said that he had an idea.

“It was a short time afterwards that he told me he wanted to put my name forward as it is the government which appoints the president of the PMU on the recommendation of the racing authorities.

“I hesitated overnight before agreeing. It is a non-executive position and when reflecting I realised it was a challenge I could take up.

“I strongly agree with the new direction the PMU’s chief executive Cyril Linette has taken over the last two years and I believe my role will, above all, be to work on the relations between the PMU and the government and the state, and its relation with the racing authorities.

“There is great deal which needs to be changed in both directions to enable us to realise the PMU’s full potential.”

The PMU is the third-largest pari-mutuel company in the world, and the largest outside Asia. It dominates betting on racing in France, even if a few competitors have been authorised recently, and is a major player in sports betting in France, too.

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philippe augier Aside from organising betting it also owns and runs Equidia, the French racing channel.

The PMU is present in one form or another in 100 countries and has an annual turnover of around €10 billion producing a profit of between €600-800 million which, in turn, is passed on to the French racing authorities with half going to France Galop and half to the trotting equivalent.

The French state’s cut of the turnover is a similar amount of around €750 million a year. Needless to say the president of the PMU is an important position for the government, but above all for the racing world which depends upon the PMU to provide and develop its income.

France’s last pre-COVID meeting was held in Marseilles on the evening of Monday, March 16. The following day the country went in to lockdown and all racing was cancelled with no date set for its resumption.

The PMU’s 13,200 betting outlets in cafes and shops all over the country were, of course, closed too. From one day to the next turnover collapsed to about 10 per cent of its usual level, although the PMU continued taking bets on the internet on racing in Hong Kong, Scandinavia and wherever it could find live racing to maintain an income stream.

France Galop then was losing €6 million of revenue every week.

After a month with still no end of lockdown in sight France Galop was determined to ensure the government was fully aware of the implications lockdown had for the racing and breeding business. France Galop wanted to ensure that racing was allowed to resume as soon as the country emerged from its

The PMU is present in one form or another in 100 countries and has an annual turnover of around €10 billion producing a profit of between €600-800 million restrictions; by then May 11 had already been put forward as a possible date for the end of the strict confinement.

Towards the end of April a video meeting was held in which the participants included the ministers of the budget and of agriculture, the president and chief executive of the PMU, the president of the trotting authority, as well as Eric Woerth, the mayor of Chantilly, an ex-minister and leading figure in France’s centre-right opposition party, and Augier.

At the meeting it was agreed that given the importance to the whole of the racing and breeding sector racing would be allowed to resume behind closed doors with strict sanitary controls from the first day after confinement, probably on Monday, May 11.

All of the local administrations concerned were informed and all of the formal

This spring, while racing did not take place, France Galop lost €6 million a week. The case for early resumption was communicated to the government, and agreement was in place for May 11... at the very last hour it still nearly did not happen and vital late night negotiations paved the way forward

procedures necessary were put in place.

Meanwhile, a programme was devised by France Galop and trainers all over the country began to work, plan and enter their horses.

On May 7, the Thursday before racing was due to resume, Emmanuel Macron, the President of France, held a “Conseil de Défence et Securiteé Nationale”, a formal and relatively rare meeting between the President, the Prime Minister and a restricted group of the most senior ministers to decide matters of the highest importance, including, of course, the end of the strict confinement.

At the end of this meeting it was announced that “racing is a sport like all of the others” and would not be allowed to resume immediately or at any specific moment in the future.

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ONSTERNATION at France Galop and among all of those who had taken part in the April meeting was followed by frantic hours of discreet lobbying and explanations. Late in the day the decision was reversed and ParisLongchamp held its first meeting as planned on Monday, May 11.

Augier is more than familiar with the inside workings of the French state and France Galop and the racing world.

For 30 years he was a director of the Deauville sales, or the Agence Française as it was then known, and was the prime mover in transforming a domestic sales company into an important part of the international bloodstock market.

In 2006, he took a step back from the bloodstock world following the creation of Arqana, while remaining a figure in the racing world not least due to his position as the mayor of Deauville, a post he has held since 2001 and to which he was re-elected in 2008, 2014 and again this year 2020.

Augier’s political career began in 1970 when he became part of the committee of the “young giscardiens” those who believed that Valery Giscard d’Estaing represented the hopes of the younger generation.

In the 1990s Augier took up a formal position in the team of the then mayor of Deauville, Anne d’Ornano, before taking over from her as mayor in 2001.

Connections have always been part of Augier’s life and those within his inner circle would probably include, for instance, both Jean Claude Rouget, one of France’s leading trainers, and Edouard Philippe, the mayor of Le Havre, Deauville’s closest city, and the

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philippe augier Prime Minister of France from 2017-2020.

Since racing in France resumed and, coinciding with Augier’s arrival at its head, the PMU has been booming registering a record turnover in July and its chief executive has already upgraded his provisions for the year.

With almost all other sports still cancelled – the French football season was abandoned at the beginning of lockdown – racing is enjoying a particular moment when it is the only live game around.

“What is most encouraging,” Augier says, “is that the gains made in internet betting during lockdown are still there even though our outlets have been open since May 11.

The PMU enjoyed a profitable spring and Augier is keen to invest in new technology, refocus on “essentials”, bring in some form of betting on jockeys as well as work closely with all the government ministries associated with the PMU

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“What is most encouraging, is that the gains made in internet betting during lockdown are still there even though our outlets have been open since May 11 “This suggests the PMU is attracting a new audience.”

Before COVID-19, 85 per cent of turnover in France came through the PMU outlets; on-course betting was only two per cent of the total in 2019.

Internet betting is vital for the PMU’s future and it is planning to make significant investments in new software this year.

“Once I was presented with the figures,” Augier says, “it was an easy decision to take.

It will be a significant sum, but we can’t move forward without the right structure.

“As we are today there would be a delay of a year to 18 months to introduce a new bet; thanks to the investment we should be able to reduce this time lag to just months.”

Cyril Linette was director of sport at Canal+, France’s principal subscription television channel, before moving to l’Equipe, the daily newspaper which covers every sport except for racing, and then to the PMU in 2018.

A year later he appointed Arnaud de Courcelles, who was the director of l’Equipe’s television channel, to run Equidia.

Since his arrival the PMU had, before Covid, succeeded in returning to growth after years of stagnation.

His policy had been to refocus the PMU and Equidia on the essentials – reducing the number of races offered and centering Equidia, its marketing and promotions, on real horse players, those who follow racing and know something about it.

His other insight is that betting on horseracing is something which is more often than not passed on from one player

to his friends or family.

“I was,” Augier remembers, “one of only a few in the racing world who supported Linette’s ideas when he arrived.

“Now that I have got to know him and the impressive team he has built I am more than ever sure that the PMU is going in the right direction.

“He has succeeded in making the PMU more efficient and closer to its clients.”

Augier says there are no plans to move away from pool betting, but he is keen to introduce some form of betting on jockeys.

“We all know that the equine stars are not around for long,” he explains, “and so we want to make our jockeys better known and appreciated particularly as in France, thanks to the allowances France Galop introduced some years ago, we have several top-class female jockeys.

“Only 30 per cent of the PMU’s current customers are female and so that is one area where there is scope for expansion.”

A

UGIER is a strong supporter of the strategic choices the PMU has taken in recent years, but he is happy to leave the daily running of the business to Linette and his teams while he turns his attention to external relations.

The PMU is closely linked to various different ministries. The Finance Ministry, which receives a percentage of turnover, the Ministry of Agriculture, which is responsible for breeding and which is part-financed by the PMU, and the Ministry of the Interior, responsible for overseeing betting.

“I shall be working closely with all three ministers,” Augier says.

“I am not certain that in recent years that “Bercy” [the finance ministry] and the racing authorities have really understood each other, we need to build a new, more efficient relationship.

“I believe the racing authorities need to adapt more of their strategy to support the PMU, we all wish to see the PMU and its turnover upon which racing relies grow.”

Augier is by nature a man of enthusiasms.

Once he is convinced himself he has always been excellent at communicating and passing on ideas to other people.

Politics, Deauville and racing have been his determining passions for decades and in many ways it seems surprising that it has taken COVID-19 to propel him to place where he can combine his experience and connections for the good of all three.

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stallion goken

Fast start

The beginning of this year’s French racing season was notable for the success of Goken with his first two-year-old runners... and the sire is still maintaining the pace at the top of the table

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UY PARIENTE has achieved a great deal as a breeder and owner since creating his Haras de Colleville on a cattle farm close to Deauville in 2007.

His yellow and white colours have become familiar in France and further afield, he is currently leading breeder in France in 2020 and among the top ten owners.

The Haras de Colleville is also a very successful commercial farm and has sold high-class horses such as Morando, Skalleti and Kenway as well as several high-priced yearlings, including a Kendargent filly to Juddmonte for 525,000gns at Tattersalls, and one of the top lots in the Arqana August Sale last year when the farm’s Kingman colt made €675,000 bought by Amanda Skiffington.

However, what marks Pariente out from many others who have established breeding operations is that he has also made stallions.

Making a stallion is a difficult business, even for those who have unlimited resources.

All but a handful of stallions are failures and few things are more difficult to predict than stallion success.

Who would have imagined that, of the group who retired to stud in 2008 Kendargent would, ten years later, be standing at a higher fee and have a higher profile than say Manduro or Lawman?

They were top racehorses with fashionable pedigrees who started their stud careers standing at significant fees at prestigious farms, and yet they have been out-performed by a non-stakes-winning son of Kendor

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Making a stallion is a difficult business, even for those who have unlimited resources. All but a handful of stallions are failures and few things are more difficult to predict than stallion success who began his career standing at €500 at a new farm, with only a handful of breeders prepared to pay for Kendargent’s services during the early years.

If Kendargent’s success appears almost uncanny it looks as though some ten years later Pariente has repeated the trick with Kendargent’s son Goken.

Goken had more going for him than his sire when he retired to the Haras de la Huderie to stand at €5,000 in 2017, and yet his success to date must have exceeded all reasonable expectations.

At the time of writing, at the end July, \

stallion goken Goken made a tremendous start with his first runners this spring when the only racing in Europe was taking place in France, but the son of Kendargent has maintained his early pace

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stallion goken Once a cattle farm, Pareinte has turned Haras de Colleville, located just outside of Deauville, into a state-of-the-art, beautiful stallion farm

Goken is the leading first-season sire in Europe by prize-money won, joint-leader by the number of stakes performers, and his ten individual winners put him in second place behind the leader Mehmas, who has had 49 runners compared with Goken’s 19.

New Bay is the leading first-season sire by winners to runners with 64 per cent, but Goken is a clear second with 53 per cent of his runners winning.

Even compared to all two-year-old sires Goken is highly placed behind only Kodiac (from 66 runners) and Dandy Man by prizemoney won, Kodiac and Mehmas by number of winners and Night Of Thunder, New Bay and Kingman by percentage winners to runners from ten or more runners.

Goken is already a remarkable success, while Colleville’s third stallion Galiway, a Listed-winning son of Galileo purchased from the Wertheimer brothers, has also made a more than promising start to his career.

He is currently among the top ten European second-crop sires by stakes horses with four from only 75 foals in his first two crops, including the Group winner Kenway and the stakes winner Wanaway.

The 17-year-old Kendargent is now a

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Goken is leading first-season sire in Europe by prize-money won, joint-leader by the number of stakes performers veteran, but in Goken and Galiway the farm has two sires who going to be popular for years to come and are ready to takeover his position as the stud’s standard-bearer.

Guillaume Vitse, the long-time manager of the Haras de Colleville, who now runs his own Noramndie Breeding, has always been an admirer of Goken’s.

“In 2017,” he remembers, “I owned only two mares and they both went to Goken.”

Vitse’s two mares Key Success and Byburg

were owned in partnership with the trainers Yan Barberot and Philippe Decouz and the two resulting Goken colts Axdavali and Go Athletico went into training with the partners without going through a sale.

“The two colts grew up together and were both healthy strong horses throughout their time on the farm. The plan was always to race them,” adds Vitse.

“It was a plan which worked out well as Axdavali was second on his debut at Chantilly before breaking his maiden in Deauville by 7l at the end of May carrying the colours of Alain Jathiere.

“The colt was then a close second, beaten by the Goken filly Livachop, in the Group 3 Prix du Bois at ParisLongchamp before disappointing when making the running in the Prix Robert Papin.

“We saw in the Robert Papin that Axdavali can’t go off in front as he did far too much, next time we shall make sure he gets a lead and comes with a run at the end of his race,” adds Vitse.

Go Athletico was also second on his debut in Lyon before winning at the same track over 6f at the end of June.

In July, Go Athletico, who has also changed

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M. SHALAA

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330 M. AL WUKAIR

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474 F. KENDARGENT

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stallion goken colours since his debut, was an excellent second in the 7f Listed Prix Roland de Chambure at ParisLongchamp.

“He has a lot of quality,” his breeder says, “and we are looking at a Group race for him at the beginning of September.”

Vitse has always been an admirer of Goken’s.

“I helped him come into the world!” he remembers. “He has always been a goodlooking horse with short canons, a good hind leg and what’s more a kind horse.

“It took everybody a bit of time to realise quite how good he was and he may have done a little too much too soon, but he came back to win stakes races at three. In the Group 1 King’s Stand Stakes he weaved all over the track trying to find a clear run and was only beaten just over length into third.”

he was switched to trainer Kevin Ryan in Britain.

On his first start for the Ryan stable Goken won a Listed over 6f at Lingfield.

Great efforts were made to teach Goken to settle and come with a late run, but more than once he refused and ruined his chances by pulling for his head.

In the King’s Stand Stakes (G1) under Jamie Spencer he settled beautifully to run the race of his life coming from last place, once he found a clear run, to be beaten just over a length.

He retired to stud with five wins and five places from 22 starts, which included two Group wins, a Listed win and a Group 1 place.

When you look closely at Goken’s profile he was clearly a gifted racehorse who deserved his chance as a stallion particularly given the

OKEN comes from the fourth crop of Kendargent and is the first foal of the Indian Rocket mare Goseley Chop, who raced in Pariente’s colours winning as a two-year-old and ending her career running in claimers on the Flat and finally over fences.

Goseley Chop’s destiny has been an unusual one as, after falling in a claimer over fences when in for only €12,000, she has produced a Group-winning leading young stallion in Goken, her three-year-old by Frankel, Hurricane Cloud, won on his debut this year and was then second in the Group 3 Prix de Guiche.

Her two-year-old Kingman colt All The King’s Men is in training with Fabrice Chappet having been bought by Fiona Carmichael for €675,000.

Goseley Chop has a yearling Kendargent filly called Kencarla.

Goken made his career debut in March for Pariente and trainer Henri Alex Pantall finishing second over four and a half furlongs before winning twice at Chantilly by 8l and then 6l.

He won the Prix du Bois comfortably after making all the running. He then ran with credit in all of the top French two-year-old races finishing fourth in the Prix Robert Papin (G2) and the Prix Morny (G1), third in the Criterium de Maisons-Laffitte and was beaten less than 3l when taking on his elders in the Prix de l’Abbaye de Longchamp (G1).

At three, he won the Group 3 Prix Texantia over five and a half furlongs and then, after running at both Royal Ascot and Goodwood,

Goken and his sire Kendargent are the ones to continue the Kendor line

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success of his sire Kendargent.

However, there were many others who retired to stud in 2017 who appeared to have a much better chance of being at the head of the European first-season sire’s table at the end of July 2020.

Goken, like Galiway and Kendargent before him, has turned quickly into an overachiever.

Their success is a testament to their owner’s belief and determination, and also to the opportunities provided by the French system and the prize-money and premiums on offer.

Pariente has supported his stallions – he has not put their progeny through sales rings but into training.

He currently has 45 horses in training in France, most of whom are by his own sires.

By the end of July he had already earned €650,000 in prize-money and premiums, while in 2019 he won around a €1 million on the track in France.

Kendargent and Goken are both out-crosses and are able to cover the vast majority of the mares available in France and Europe.

Galiway carries the dominant strains of Galileo and Danehill, and he appears to work well with Kendargent mares, in both cases significant factors in their success.

Kendargent is also by Kendor out of a Linamix mare and inbred to Kalamoun, three important influences even if they are obscure outside France.

Kendor and Linamix were top stallions in France at a time when French breeding was depressed and played only a small part in the wider European scene, but both produced horses who had electric speed, as well as the difficult temperament which often goes with it.

Kendargent’s statistics are not as outstanding as they were when he covered only a handful of his owner’s mares, but he continues to produce gifted horses year in and year out; two of the better French-trained two-year-olds of 2020 are See The Rose and Xaario, a Kendargent filly and colt in training with André Fabre and Pia Brandt.

It seems that the Kendor sire line is going to continue to be important in France at least, and there will be others by Kendargent and his sons who will inherit the speed and the talent both Kendor and Linamix possessed.

Kendor’s best two sons, the Group 1 winners Keltos and Charge d’Affaires, both proved to be sub-fertile and so it was left to Kendargent to carry on the line which, of course, would never have been possible without Guy Pariente and his belief in his own horses.

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french stallion stats Leading sires in France 2020: (by prize-money earned to August 18, 2020) Stallion

Breeding

Siyouni Le Havre Kendargent Wootton Bassett Shamardal Rajsaman Kingman Make Believe Anodin Makfi Dabirsim Charm Spirit Elusive City Rio de La Plata Intello Olympic Glory Sea The Moon Penny’s Picnic Air Chief Marshal Lope de Vega Dubawi Evasive Myboycharlie Camelot Zoffany Deep Impact Dark Angel Sea The Stars Acclamation Dream Ahead Holy Roman Emperor Style Vendome Motivator Manduro Toronado Kheleyf Whipper Champs Elysees Frankel Teofilo George Vancouver Pedro the Great Galileo Silver Frost Orpen Rock of Gibraltar Zanzibari Galiway

Pivotal-Sichilla (Danehill) Noverre-Marie Rheinberg (Surako) Kendor-Pax Bella (Linamix) Iffraaj-Balladonia (Primo Dominie) Giant’s Causeway-Helsinki (Machiavellian) Linamix-Rose Quartz (Lammtarra) Invincible Spirit-Zenda (Zamindar) Makfi-Rosie’s Posy (Suave Dancer) Anabaa-Born Gold(Blushing Groom) Dubawi-Dhelaal (Green Desert) Hat Trick-Rumored (Royal Academy) Invincible Spirit-L’Enjoleuse (Montjeu) Elusive Quality-Star of Paris (Dayjur) Rahy-Express Way (Ahmad) Galileo-Impressionnante (Danehill) Choisir-Acidanthera (Alzao) Sea The Stars-Sanwa (Monsun) Kheleyf-Zerky, by Kingmambo) Danehill Dancer-Hawala (Warning) Shamardal-Lady Vettori (Vettori) Dubai Millennium-Zomaradah (Deploy) Elusive Quality-Canda (Storm Cat) Danetime-Dulceata (Rousillon) Montjeu-Tarfah (Kingmambo) Dansili-Tyranny (Machiavellian) Sunday Silence-Wind in Her Hair (Alzao) Acclamation-Midnight Angel (Machiavellian) Cape Cross-Urban Sea (Miswaki) Royal Applause-Princess Athena (Ahonoora) Diktat-Land of Dreams (Cadeaux Genereux) Danehill-L’On Vite (Secretariat) Anabaa-Place Vendome (Dr Fong) Montjeu-Out West (Gone West) Monsun-Mandellicht (Be My Guest) High Chaparral-Wana Doo (Grand Slam) Green Desert-Society Lady (Mr. Prospector) Miesque’s Son-Myth to Reality (Sadler’s Wells) Danehill-Hasili (Kahyasi) Galileo-Kind (Danehill) Galileo-Speirbhean (Danehill) Henrythenavigator-Versailles Treaty (Danzig) Henrythenavigator-Glatisant (Rainbow Quest) Sadler’s Wells-Urban Sea (Miswaki) Verglas-Hidden Silver (Anabaa) Lure-Bonita Francita (Devil’s Bag) Danehill-Offshore Boom (Be My Guest) Smart Strike-Zinziberine (Zieten) Galileo-Danzigaway (Danehill)

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Courtesy of Weatherbys

To Stud

Rnrs

Runs

Wnrs

Wins

2011 2010 2008 2012 2005 2013 2015 2016 2015 2011 2014 2015 2005 2013 2014 2015 2015 2014 2011 2011 2006 2011 2010 2014 2012 2007 2008 2010 2004 2012 2007 2014 2006 2008 2015 2005 2006 2010 2013 2008 2014 2014 2002 2011 2000 2003 2011 2016

134 105 122 79 26 142 31 11 80 80 116 62 82 64 63 66 22 71 67 48 28 72 46 43 52 8 47 35 26 42 26 55 46 54 41 55 43 13 24 21 65 49 18 40 28 36 38 21

452 357 537 278 93 587 63 41 319 324 382 262 373 264 207 203 60 304 325 141 64 303 200 128 191 13 157 101 91 154 132 217 156 180 129 225 183 41 45 60 261 178 38 171 143 159 134 70

43 39 42 17 14 36 12 3 22 32 20 21 20 24 14 17 8 19 16 13 9 19 15 16 19 2 11 12 14 12 14 11 13 12 15 12 10 4 10 8 15 15 5 14 10 12 12 6

58 56 59 20 17 49 13 5 31 42 25 28 25 27 17 20 9 22 24 17 11 22 21 19 25 2 14 18 15 16 19 18 17 14 17 16 16 5 12 12 19 19 5 16 12 12 14 9

Wnrs/Rnrs% SWnrs SWs 32.08 37.14 34.42 21.51 53.84 25.35 38.70 27.27 27.50 40.00 17.24 33.87 24.39 37.50 22.22 25.75 36.36 26.76 23.88 27.08 32.14 26.38 32.60 37.20 36.53 25.00 23.40 34.28 53.84 28.57 53.84 20.00 28.26 22.22 36.58 21.81 23.25 30.76 41.66 38.09 23.07 30.61 27.77 35.00 35.71 33.33 31.57 28.57

4 5 4 5 6 0 4 1 2 0 1 1 1 0 1 2 2 0 0 2 3 0 0 2 0 1 1 3 2 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 3 3 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 2

4 5 4 5 6 0 5 2 2 0 1 1 1 0 1 3 2 0 0 2 4 0 0 2 0 1 1 4 2 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 2 3 3 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 2

£ 1,197,418 955,893 901,048 883,652 755,605 663,710 655,745 629,508 594,053 572,496 519,227 483,384 466,291 456,157 411,582 394,575 388,556 376,296 375,803 363,192 354,132 339,062 323,566 311,653 310,598 309,923 307,466 305,944 291,764 288,199 287,230 285,647 269,253 268,255 263,411 259,807 259,371 244,037 241,996 241,101 240,690 235,793 234,864 233,030 231,778 227,335 219,165 218,725

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french stallion stats Leading sires of two-year-olds in France 2020: (by prize-money earned to August 18, 2020) Stallion

Breeding

Goken Siyouni Kendargent Kheleyf Acclamation Dabirsim Penny’s Picnic Galiway Myboycharlie Pomellato Clodovil Dream Ahead Rajsaman Pedro the Great Dariyan Wootton Bassett Toronado Shalaa Bated Breath Olympic Glory Camelot Territories Dark Angel Evasive Style Vendome Vale of York Charm Spirit Helmet Stormy River Iffraaj Gutaifan Morandi Frankel Amarillo Anjaal Mayson The Wow Signal Arcano Gregorian Scissor Kick Invincible Spirit Captain Chop Prince of Lir Intello Martinborough Holy Roman Emperor Sir Prancealot Showcasing

Kendargent-Gooseley Chope (Indian Rocket) 2017 18 61 11 14 61.11 Pivotal-Sichilla (Danehill) 2011 14 30 5 8 35.71 Kendor-Pax Bella (Linamix) 2008 15 33 5 7 33.33 Green Desert-Society Lady (Mr. Prospector) 2005 11 40 4 6 36.36 Royal Applause-Princess Athena (Ahonoora) 2004 5 10 3 3 60.00 Hat Trick-Rumored (Royal Academy) 2014 21 49 5 5 23.80 Kheleyf-Zerky (Kingmambo) 2014 16 40 5 6 31.25 Galileo-Danzigaway (Danehill) 2016 7 19 2 5 28.57 Danetime-Dulceata (Rousillon) 2010 17 40 2 2 11.76 Big Shuffle-Passata (Polar Falcon) 2010 11 41 2 2 18.18 Danehill-Clodora (Linamix) 2004 1 6 1 5 100.00 Diktat-Land of Dreams (Cadeaux Genereux) 2012 8 25 3 3 37.50 Linamix-Rose Quartz (Lammtarra) 2013 11 23 1 2 9.09 Henrythenavigator-Glatisant (Rainbow Quest) 2014 10 23 3 4 30.00 Shamardal-Daryakana (Selkirk) 2017 9 25 2 3 22.22 Iffraaj-Balladonia (Primo Dominie) 2012 8 11 3 4 37.50 High Chaparral-Wana Doo (Grand Slam) 2015 5 9 3 4 60.00 Invincible Spirit-Ghurra (War Chant) 2017 12 18 2 2 16.66 Dansili-Tantina (Distant View) 2013 3 4 2 3 66.66 Choisir-Acidanthera (Alzao) 2015 13 23 3 3 23.07 Montjeu-Tarfah (Kingmambo) 2014 6 13 2 2 33.33 Invincible Spirit-Taranto (Machiavellian) 2017 9 18 1 2 11.11 Acclamation-Midnight Angel (Machiavellian) 2008 9 16 1 2 11.11 Elusive Quality-Canda (Storm Cat) 2011 6 18 2 2 33.33 Anabaa-Place Vendome (Dr Fong) 2014 13 35 1 1 7.69 Invincible Spirit-Red Vale (Halling) 2011 6 19 1 1 16.66 Invincible Spirit-L’Enjoleuse (Montjeu) 2015 4 14 1 1 25.00 Exceed And Excel-Accessories (Singspiel) 2013 3 7 1 2 33.33 Verglas-Miss Bio (River Mist) 2008 5 14 2 3 40.00 Zafonic-Pastorale (Nureyev) 2007 3 7 2 3 66.66 Dark Angel-Alikhlas (Lahib) 2016 6 18 1 1 16.66 Holy Roman Emperor-Vezina (Bering) 2017 6 20 1 2 16.66 Galileo-Kind (Danehill) 2013 5 7 2 2 40.00 Holy Roman Emperor-Alte Kunst (Royal Academy) 2016 3 8 1 2 33.33 Bahamian Bounty-Ballymore Celebre (Peintre Celebre) 2016 2 6 2 3 100.00 Invincible Spirit-Mayleaf (Pivotal) 2013 5 11 2 2 40.00 Starspangledbanner-Muravka (High Chaparral) 2016 2 4 2 2 100.00 Oasis Dream-Tariysha (Daylami) 2011 1 4 1 1 100.00 Clodovil-Three Days In May (Cadeaux Genereux) 2015 1 3 1 2 100.00 Redoute’s Choice-Back Pass (Quest for Fame) 2017 9 17 0 0 0.00 Green Desert-Rafha (Kris) 2003 6 7 1 1 16.66 Indian Rocket-Hatane Chope (Sin Kiang) 2013 10 33 1 1 10.00 Kodiac-Esuvia (Whipper) 2017 2 7 0 0 0.00 Galileo-Impressionnante (Danehill) 2014 10 14 1 1 10.00 Deep Impact-Halwa Song (Nureyev) 2017 8 15 1 1 12.50 Danehill-L’On Vite (Secretariat) 2007 3 12 2 2 66.66 Tamayuz-Mona Em (Catrail) 2013 2 4 1 1 50.00 Oasis Dream-Arabesque (Zafonic) 2011 3 5 1 1 33.33

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To Stud

Rnrs

Runs

Courtesy of Weatherbys Wnrs

Wins

Wnrs/Rnrs% SWnrs SWs

£

1 2 209,767 0 0 111,983 1 1 95,016 0 0 85,731 1 1 83,483 0 0 78,819 0 0 71,432 1 1 71,211 0 0 71,055 0 0 58,537 1 1 57,161 0 0 56,992 0 0 53,965 0 0 52,864 0 0 51,236 0 0 49,492 0 0 48,389 0 0 43,627 1 1 38,982 0 0 38,634 1 1 37,627 0 0 37,053 0 0 35,805 0 0 35,586 0 0 33,935 0 0 33,475 0 0 33,314 0 0 32,568 0 0 32,373 0 0 32,000 0 0 31,991 0 0 31,711 0 0 30,338 0 0 29,676 0 0 29,661 0 0 28,636 0 0 28,558 1 1 26,593 1 1 25,508 0 0 25,244 0 0 24,406 0 0 24,321 0 0 22,372 0 0 21,931 0 0 21,605 0 0 21,126 0 0 20,931 0 0 20,914

Rubaiyat

No Limit Credit

Horse of the Year 2019 winner Dr. Busch-Memorial, Gr.3 winner Gran Criterium, Gr.2 winner Preis des Winterfavoriten, Gr.3

winner Schwarzgold-Rennen, Gr.3 winner BBAG Auktionsrennen Baden-Baden winner BBAG Auktionsrennen Dortmund

Classic contenders

Kalifornia Queen winner Diana-Trial, Gr.2

Wonderful Moon

winner Union-Rennen, Gr.2 winner Cologne-Classic, Gr.3 winner Herzog von Ratibor-Rennen, Gr.3

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Premier Yearling Sale

October Mixed Sales

4th September 2020

16th and 17th October 2020

www.bbag-sales.de

1st entries close: Friday, 24th July, 2nd entries close: Monday, 7th September

photo of the month: Hollie Doyle and Donjah

Above, Hollie Doyle wearing the Blue Diamond Stud colours. It was announced at the beginning of August that the talented young jockey has accepted a retainer to ride for Blue Diamond Stud’s owner Imad Al Sagar.

“We are thrilled to add Hollie Doyle to our team,” said Imad Al Sagar. “We have all been impressed with how Hollie has risen to become one of the best of her profession. She is an extremely dedicated, strong and astute jockey.

We have some lovely horses to run for us this season and I look forward to Hollie becoming an invaluable member of our team.”

Hollie Doyle said: “I am delighted to be teaming up with Imad Al Sagar for the near future. I hope that we will have plenty of success!”

Blue Diamond Stud’s homebred stallion Decorated Knight stands at the Irish National Stud and his first yearlings go through the sale ring this autumn.

(See online Part 1 of our Yearling Sale Ready preview: Stallions with first Yearlings 2020). Doyle will get to know the green colours of Blue Diamond Stud and the progeny of the Group 2 winner very well over the next 12 months.

The new partnership got off to nearly immediate success with the Frankel filly Faisal’s maiden win at Lingfield on August 4, and then stepped up four days later to Group 3 success with Extra Elusive at Haydock (photo above).

The Mastercraftsman gelding was bought back by Blue Diamond Stud for 300,000gns a the Tattersalls Horses In Training Sale in 2018 when Sagar and former racing ownership partner Saleh Al Homaizi went separate ways.

In the middle of August, and outside of her retainer, Doyle travelled to Germany for a first Group 1 ride aboard the Ed Vaughan-trained and Anthony Oppenheimerowned Dame Malliot in the Preis von Europa. The combination finished third to Donjah (left), a Teofilo four-year-old filly trained by Henk Grewe for Darius Racing, a second Group 1 victory for the trainer and 17th for the sire.

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LE HAVRE LEADING SIRE IN FRANCE WITH 9 BLACK TYPE HORSES Stallion

1

LE HAVRE

2

Runners

Winners

BT Horses

105

39

9

SIYOUNI

135

43

9

3

SHAMARDAL

26

14

8

4

WOOTTON BASSETT

79

17

8

5

DUBAWI

29

9

7

© Agence G / Scoopdyga

N°

Source: Th. Stallion Guide 18/8

2020 TOP PERFORMERS

VAUCELLES

PORT GUILLAUME

WONDERFUL TONIGHT

Gr.2 Prix de Malleret

Gr.2 Prix Hocquart Longines

Gr.3 Prix de Minerve

DON’T MISS HIS YEARLINGS SELLING SOON! Mathieu ALEX • +33 (0)6 26 59 19 18

I Sylvain VIDAL • +33 (0)6 20 99 10 15

THREE OUTSTANDING RACEHORSES WITH A COMBINED

13 GROUP 1 WINS First crop yearlings now selling!

CHURCHILL European Champion 2YO and dual Classic-winning miler by GALILEO

HIGHLAND REEL Top class 2YO and 7-time Gr.1 winner by GALILEO

CARAVAGGIO Brilliantly fast Gr.1 winner at 2 and 3 by SCAT DADDY

Contact: Coolmore Stud, Fethard, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, Ireland. Tel: +353-52-6131298. E-mail: sales@coolmore.ie Website: www.coolmore.com