WHEN His Highness the Aga Khan has a stakes winner, it usually means good news for others. Each year the Aga Khan Studs sell some duplicates they have in families, and the owners of the culled stock are left smiling.

This is the case following the weekend success of Ezeliya in the Group 3 Salsabil Stakes at Navan, the three-year-old’s second win in three starts. The daughter of Dubawi (Dubai Millennium) holds a number of classic entries, and they include the Oaks at Epsom and its equivalent at the Curragh. Her dam was placed in the Irish Oaks, while a half-sister to that mare won the same race in 1997.

Ezeliya is Dubawi’s ninth stakes winner so far this year. They are headed by Group/Grade 1 winners Rebel’s Romance in the Sheema Classic and Master Of The Seas in the Maker’s Mark Mile Stakes. Taking a step into stakes company for the first time, Ezeliya began to make progress with three furlongs to run and, sweeping down the outside, she proved too strong for her rivals as she got up to win in the closing stages from Purple Lily in the 10-furlong contest.

The Dermot Weld-trained filly ran just twice last year, breaking her maiden on her second attempt when winning at Cork.

Ezeliya is the second foal out of the multiple group-winning Teofilo (Galileo) mare, Eziyra. She was a champion older female in Ireland and won pattern races in each of the three seasons she raced. At two she claimed the seven-furlong Group 3 Park Stakes, added two more at three and was third in the Group 1 Irish Oaks, while at four her pattern wins included the Group 2 Blandford Stakes over 10 furlongs. She placed third in both the Group 1 Yorkshire Oaks and Hong Kong Vase.

The first foal out of Eziyra was Eziva (Medaglia D’Oro), a winner last year who then sold for €250,000 at the Goffs November Sale to McKeever Bloodstock. Following on is a two-year-old son of Siyouni (Pivotal), but Eziyra’s subsequent colt by Wootton Bassett (Iffraaj) died since birth, and last year she was rested.

Consistency

This is a family that has been good for the Aga Khan Studs, and also for the late Queen Elizabeth II. The weekend winner’s third dam was Ebaziya (Darshaan), and three of that mare’s four victories were in listed races. Such was her consistency that she was never out of the frame in nine starts, and her placed efforts included running third in the Group 2 Blandford Stakes. As good as she was racing, she was an outstanding broodmare.

In the breeding shed she had 14 foals, four of them colts, 13 runners and eight winners. A remarkable half of her winners gained a Group 1 success. Two of these won the same race, the Group 1 Ascot Gold Cup.

They were Enzeli (Kahyasi) and Estimate (Monsun), the latter for the English monarch. Edabiya (Rainbow Quest) won the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes, while Ebadiyla (Sadler’s Wells) was the only one of the quartet to double up at the highest level, winning both the Irish Oaks and the Prix Royal Oak.

Weekend delight for Bonneval

ZARAK had the bad luck to be a three-year-old the same year as Almanzor, who beat him in the Group 1 Prix du Jockey Club-French Derby and Group 2 Prix Guillaume d’Ornano.

However, Zarak got his Group 1 win the following summer, beating Silverwave by three-quarters of a length in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud over 12 furlongs. He had come close two months before that when he was a short-neck second to Cloth Of Stars in the Group 1 Prix Ganay over a furlong and a half less at the same venue.

It was some measure of compensation at the weekend when Zarak’s five-year-old son Haya Zark went one better than his sire and won the Group 1 Prix Ganay, adding to a trio of Group 3 wins.

A first winner for his unplaced dam Haya City (Elusive City), Haya Zark is the first stakes winner in the family for a few generations, not since Subotica (Pampabird). That son of Haya Zark’s fourth dam Terre De Feu (Busted) also won the Prix Ganay, as well as the Group 1 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe and the Group 1 Grand Prix de Paris.

Zarak is a son of the great English stallion Dubawi (Dubai Millennium), and so is by the sire of Too Darn Hot, Al Kazeem, Makfi, New Bay, Night Of Thunder and Poet’s Voice, all Group 1-winning sires of at least one Group 1 winner. Zarak was among Europe’s leading freshmen in 2021, supplying a double-digit tally of winners including four blacktype earners. That was an eye-catching start for a horse who won a mile late-season maiden at two.

Most impressive

Now Zarak is compiling an impressive roll of honour of winners. Both of his Group 1 winners, Haya Zark and the Grosser Preis von Baden winner Zagrey, are from his first crop, and it is worth noting that the Haras de Bonneval stallion’s first four crops, including this year’s juveniles, were all conceived from €12,000 coverings. He more than doubled to €25,000 for the covering year in 2022, but that was short-lived, and last year and this you have had to pay €60,000.

Five more members of Zarak’s first crop have won group or graded stakes, and his seven pattern winners in that initial cohort are matched by another seven in his second crop. While his current batch of three-year-olds only numbers one group-winning juvenile from last year, it will not stay that way for too long.

I could go on and on about how successful Zarak is as a sire, with two other listed winners, the Group 1 Prix de Diane-French Oaks runner-up La Parisienne, and more to his credit, but he will be mentioned many more times here in the months to come.

Italian classics fall to a pair of Irish-breds

The Group 2 Mill Reef Stakes winner Kessaar (Kodiac) stood for his first five seasons at Tony O’Callaghan’s Tally-Ho Stud, but this year is based in Italy.

How apt it was therefore that his only stakes winner on the flat, the Tally-Ho Stud-bred Melfi, should build on his top juvenile form in Italy and win the weekend’s Group 3 Premio Parioli 2000 Guineas, recording his sixth success. Bought for €33,000 as a yearling at the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale, his wins in Italy have earned connections some £150,000.

Melfi is one of three winners out of Miss Purity Pinker (One Cool Cat), and all have been successful in Italy. One of the others is Tarhun (Vadamos), and he has already passed the post in front nine times. Miss Purity Pinker is a half-sister to another runner who was popular in Italy, Azzeccagarbugli (Kodiac), and he numbers three listed races among 11 career victories.

Beenham

The fillies’ classic equivalent, the Group 3 Premio Regina Elena 1000 Guineas, was won by Beenham, a daughter of Havana Grey (Havana Gold), and that stallion’s 17th stakes winner. The Group 1 Derrinstown Stud Flying Five Stakes winner Havana Grey has had a remarkable rise to the top, and the best is yet to come.

Beenham was bred by Hunting Hill Stud, owned and operated by Kathryn Birch and Conor Quirke, and sold as a yearling at the Tattersalls Somervville Yearling Sale for 30,000gns.

Though she won on her second start, over five furlongs at Goodwood, she didn’t add to that in seven more starts for Rod Millman at two. Unsold at 18,000gns at the horses in training sale, she did find her way to Italy and a classic victory. She is now the best of five winners and a couple of placed runners out of Ares Choix (Choisir), a juvenile winner in France where she was stakes-placed.

Hunting Hill has a yearling half-sister to Beenham by Awtaad (Cape Cross) and their dam has a filly foal this year by King Of Change (Farhh).