11 minute read
Newmarket July week
UNDEFEATED
City Of Troy going from strength to strength, writes Amy Bennett
WE ALL KNOW the old adage about waiting for buses – two come along at once.
So it was with US Triple Crown winners; after a wait of 37 years, American Pharoah ended the drought in 2015 and, just three years after, Justify followed suit.
The pair both stand at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud, Kentucky from where American Pharoah has sired seven top level stakes winners from his three crops.
His younger stud mate has sired a pair of Grade 1 scorers so far from his first crop, including his three-year-old daughter Aspen Grove, who triumphed in the Belmont Oaks (G1) on 8 July – the same day his son Verifying landed the Indiana Derby (G3).
However, it is Justify’s current crop of juveniles who are now making headlines. The son of Scat Daddy was represented by two juvenile Group 2 winners in the space of 24 hours in Europe in mid-July, while the filly Living Magic also landed the Listed My Dear Stakes at Woodbine on the same weekend.
First came City Of Troy, who romped home by over 6l in the Superlative Stakes (G2) at Newmarket’s July meeting for Sue Magnier, Michael Tabor and Derrick Smith. The colt had made a winning debut over 7f at The Curragh just two weeks earlier, and has now been installed as a hot favourite for next year’s Classics.
Less than a day later across the Channel, Ramatuelle scored her second Group success when skipping home in the Prix Robert Papin (G2) by 4l from the Ballydoyle raider His Majesty, by another son of Scat Daddy in No Nay Never.
A €100,000 graduate of the Arqana August Yearling Sale, she is out of the Raven’s Pass mare Raven’s Lady. Successful in the Goldene Peitsche (G2) for trainer Marco Botti, as well as the Summer Stakes (G3) at York, Raven’s Lady went on to race in the US in 2019 winning an allowance race at Gulfstream, but finishing down the field in four starts in graded stakes company.
The mare hails from the deep family of Sueboog, developed by the late Tim Rootes of Shutford Stud, being out of the unraced Pivotal mare Pivotal Lady, herself at halfsister to the Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan victor and sire Best Of The Bests (Machiavellian), as well as the dam of the dual Group 3 winner and Melbourne Cup-placed Prince Of Arran (Shirocco).
City Of Troy and his year-older ful-lbrother Bertinelli, who won the London Gold Cup Heritage Handicap at Newbury in May, are their sire’s sole winners in Britain to date.
The pair are out of the Galileo mare Together Forever, not to be confused with that mare’s Classic-winning full-sister Forever Together. Together Forever, three years older than her Oaks-winning sister, triumphed in the Fillies’ Mile (G1) and was beaten only a head in the Musidora Stakes (G3) before coming up short in the Oaks at Epsom and The Curragh. She has already produced a trio of stakes performers, all by War Front.
Interestingly, both Raven’s Lady and Together Forever visited fellow Ashford Stud inmate Uncle Mo after foaling their Justify progeny, with Raven’s Lady foaling a filly (before returning to Justify, to whom she produced a colt this year), and Together Forever also producing a filly, before delivering a filly by Dubawi this year.
Scat still the Daddy
The death of Scat Daddy in 2015 – the same year that Justify was foaled – was a notable loss for the stallion ranks, leaving behind as he did plenty of blazing speed.
The son of Johannesburg has a number of stallion sons at stud, although apart from No Nay Never at Coolmore, Justify and Mendelssohn at Ashford, and Caravaggio in Japan, the remainder are all standing for fees below (and often well below) €20,000.
Caravaggio has built up some air miles during his six seasons at stud, standing in Ireland, the US and now Japan. However, breeders were reminded once again of his talents when he was represented by his second career Group 1 winner as Whitebeam triumphed in the Diana Stakes (G1) on the Saratoga Turf.
Juddmonte’s homebred four-year-old, Listed-placed last year for Harry and Roger Charlton, was a Group 3 winner at Pimlico in May, and battled tenaciously to score by a nose over her stablemate In Italian (Dubawi), who includes last year’s renewal among her four previous victories at the highest level.
We three Kings
Currently lying third in the list of leading sires behind his stud mate Frankel and Siyouni, Kingman is enjoying a stand-out season around the globe.
In the first two weeks of July alone, he was represented by not only the Frenchbased Group 1 winner Feed The Flame, but also the International Stakes (G3) winner Mashhoor and Turf King, who struck at Group 3 level in Canada.
Away from that trio of Group/Graded scorers, Nostrum also won the Listed Henry Cecil Stakes and Kinross finished a good third in the July Cup (G1). Third placed in last year’s Dewhurst Stakes (G1) behind Chaldean, Nostrum, a son of Mirror Lake (Dubai Destination), is reportedly heading to the Prix Jacques Le Marois next time out.
Kingman may have some way to go to catch Frankel in the stallion rankings, but he thoroughly deserves his current lofty standing, his best so far
Owner-breeders to the fore
With big operations and a handful of stallions often dominating the headlines, victories for smaller owners and breeders are always worthy of note.
Such it was that two of the biggest races of Newmarket’s July meeting went to owner-breeders whose broodmare bands are numerically a long way from the big battalions.
Shaquille burst onto centre stage at Royal Ascot with a sensational victory for his trainer Julie Camacho and owner-breeder Martin Hughes, who bred the three-year-old in partnership with Michael Kerr-Dineen, in the Commonwealth Cup (G1).
The colt proved that victory was no fluke when overcoming yet another bad start to storm clear in the 6f July Cup (G1), a length and a half clear of Run To Freedom.
The latter came close to providing another notable result in 2023 for his sire Muhaarar, who was represented two days earlier by Shadwell’s Princess Of Wales’s Stakes (G2) victor Israr – a son of the outstanding Taghrooda – who handed a four-and-a-half-length beating to Adayar in the 1m4f contest.
As Adrien Cugnasse writes on page 70 ,who saw that coming for Muhaarar?
Muhaarar now stands at Haras des Faunes having relocated to France in 2022. It is the same move made by Shaquille’s sire Charm Spirit, who upped sticks from Tweenhills to move to Haras du Logis Saint German in 2021, standing for €5,000 this year –a far cry from the £17,500 charged when Shaquille was conceived in 2019, or the £25,000 in his first year at stud.
Neither stallion is likely to be recalled to the British stallion ranks, in spite of their current top sons, but recent results at least give a timely reminder of the success to be found outside of the leading sires’ table.
Half an hour before Shaquille’s romp in the July Cup, Biggles scored a 2l victory in the Bunbury Cup – albeit not a stakes race but still one of the more prestigious handicaps of the season.
It was a seventh career success for the six-year-old son of Zoffany, and a notable result for the gelding’s owner-breeder Lady Cobham. Biggles is her first winner of the year in Britain and netted her £93,272 in prize-money, only fractionally under her previous best prize-money total the last decade when five winners netted her £95,513 in 2014.
Bought back-in at Book 3 of the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale in 2018, Biggles is the only winner to date out of the winning Green Desert mare At A Clip.
While there is little of note under the first two dams, the third dam is the Group 1-placed juvenile Shy Princess (Irish River), whose progeny include the Group 2 winner Diffident, as well as the Listed winner Shy Lady. Her foals include such as the top-class Zafeen, the Group 3 winner Ya Hajar, and stakes winners Akeed Champion, Atlantic Sport and Shy Angel.
Nashwa back to brilliant best
The July meeting also saw the return to top form of Imad Al Sagar’s brilliant filly Nashwa, who blitzed her rivals in the Falmouth Stakes (G1) with contemptuous ease.
Triumphant in the Prix de Diane (G1) and Nassau Stakes (G1) at three, the daughter of
Frankel was fourth in the Prix Corrida (G2) on her return at four and was beaten half a length when second in the Hoppings Stakes (G3) on Newcastle’s All-Weather at the end of June.
Dropped back to a mile at Newmarket, she made light of the stormy conditions to triumph by 5l from the Coronation Stakes (G1) runner-up Remarquee (Kingman) and recent Pretty Polly Stakes (G1) heroine Via Sistina (Fastnet Rock).
Her Listed-winning Pivotal dam Princess Loulou has a yearling colt by Dubawi and returned this year to Frankel.
Al Sagar’s Blue Diamond Stud registered a Group double as a breeder when Araminta (Gleneagles) won the Prix Chloe (G3) two days after Nashwa’s triumph. She was sold for 82,000gns to Blandford Bloodstock in Book 2 of the 2021 Tattersalls October Yearling Sale, and is out of the late Lady Rothschild’s Group 3 winner Mince (Medicean), herself purchased for 130,000gns from the Rothschild dispersal at the Tattersalls December Sale in 2019. Sadly, the mare died having produced only Araminta for Al Sagar.
First stakes winners on the board for first-season sires Magna Grecia and Calyx
WHILE PLENTY of this year’s first-crop sires have been quick to get winners on the board, stakes winners were slower to follow during the early part of the season.
Numerical leader Blue Point (18) was the first to hit the mark with Big Evs at Royal Ascot, but in July a couple more young sires celebrated their first stakes success.
Myconian, sired by Coolmore’s Magna Grecia, was sixth behind Big Evs in the Listed Windsor Castle (his fifth race of the season), but Amy Murphy sent the colt back to France, where he had made his winning debut in March, to land the Listed Prix Yacowlef.
Bred in the name of Lisbrook, the colt was a €27,000 graduate of the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale.
Although his dam, the Choisir mare Sirici, was a Listed winner, you have to go back to the fourth dam Amazed to find more black-type, thanks to her Listed winners Stunned and Dazed And Amazed, as well as Amazed’s full-brother, the teak-tough sprinter Bishops Court.
Magna Grecia’s stud mate Calyx himself showed speed at two and the son of Kingman became the first of the freshman sires to get a Group winner when Persian Dreamer continued a dream season for Amo Racing with a win in the Duchess of Cambridge Stakes (G2).
A winner on debut on the Rowley Mile in April, the filly was fourth in both the Listed Marygate Fillies’ Stakes in May and the Albany Stakes (G3) in June, and stayed on strongly to win on the July Course.
Bred in Kentucky by Diamond Creek Farm, the filly is a €145,000 graduate of the Goffs Orby Sale. She is one of three winners out of the placed mare Surprisingly (Galileo), a full-sister to the Group 3 winner Tiger Moth, who finished runner-up in both the Irish Derby and Melbourne Cup, as well as a half-sister to the smart juvenile and sire Coash House (Oasis Dream).
Away from stakes action, Race The Wind, who hails from a stellar female family, became a fourth winner for Too Darn Hot when taking the EBF fillies’ maiden on the Saturday of the Newmarket July meeting.
The Godolphin homebred filly is out of the Street Cry mare Falls Of Lora. She is a half-sister to the multiple Group winner Master Of The Seas and the dam of Albahr (Dubawi), a two-year-old winner of the Group 1 Summer Stakes, and of Cascadian (New Approach), an Australian three-time Group 1 winner over 7f to 1m2f, who won the Australian Cup (G1) this March.
Grand-dam Firth Of Lorne (Danehill) was a runner-up in the 2002 Poule d’Essai des Pouliches (G1) to Zenda, who is the dam of Kingman. Firth Of Lorne, daughter of the Cherry Hinton winner and 1,000 Guineas second-placed Keerara (Diesis), claimed her French Classic placing ridden by Frankie Dettori wearing Sheikh Mohammed’s own colours.
Race The Wind has a Group 1 entry in the 7f Moyglare Stakes.
