MUSTAMEET was trained by Kevin Prendergast for the late Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum. While long gone from both the racing and breeding scene, he was in the spotlight at the weekend when his son, Nickle Back, won the Grade 1 Scilly Isles Novices’ Chase at Sandown.

Nickle Back was bred by Olive Gordon and sold as a three-year-old through Peter Nolan Bloodstock at the Tattersalls Ireland August Sale, to PJ Cosgrave for €12,000. He is the first blacktype winner for his sire, who spent most of his stud career at Robert Honner’s Clongiffen Stud in Longwood, near Enfield. Nickle Back is also the first winner for his dam, the smart Basanta (Sadler’s Wells) mare Mill House Girl.

Mustameet was a Shadwell homebred son of Sahm (Mr Prospector) and he raced 26 times over six seasons, winning nine times from seven to 10 furlongs, and placing 11 times. He was up to Group 2 class, though one of his best runs was to finish fourth, behind Dylan Thomas, Ouija Board and Alexander Goldrun, all multiple winners at the highest level, in the Group 1 Irish Champion Stakes. Mustameet was just a length and a half behind the third, and more than two lengths ahead of the only other starter, Ace.

Nine wins

Eight of Mustameet’s nine wins were in stakes races. He beat Group 1 winner Chelsea Rose by three lengths when gaining his biggest success, in the Group 2 Royal Whip Stakes, won the Group 3 Gladness Stakes twice, in 2005 and 2007 and was runner-up in the intervening year, and he had Arch Rebel four lengths in arrears when capturing the Listed Celebration Stakes at the Curragh. While Nickle Back is his first blacktype winner, and did so at Grade 1 level, Mustameet hit the crossbar on a number of occasions, with his sons, History Of Fashion, Meet And Greet and Outlaw Peter, all finishing second at either Grade 1 or 2 level.

Mill House Girl enjoyed most of her best days at the races when trained by Shane Donohue, though she did have three other trainers for short periods afterwards. Three times successful on the level, twice in bumpers, she went on to win three times under National Hunt rules, twice over hurdles.

Runner-up in the Grade 3 Joe Mac Novice Hurdle at Tipperary, Mill House Girl ran a blinder to place third in a Grade 2 novices’ hurdle at Cheltenham as a five-year-old.

Outdone

Mill House Girl has now done something that each of her first three dams have also achieved, and that is to breed a blacktype National Hunt winner, though she has outdone the others by producing a Grade 1 winner.

Her unraced dam Karalee (Arokar) bred Grade 3 Aintree chase winner Katachenko (Kutub) and is also grandam of Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed Archie Boy (Basanta).

Karalee is a half-sister to Dancing Hero (Simply Great) and the best of his five wins came in a Grade 2 chase at Gowran Park. They are out of the unraced Buck And Roll (Buckskin), a half-sister to the smart flat and hurdle performer Tara Lee (Tarqogan). Runner-up in the Listed Irish Cesarewitch, Tara Lee was a Grade 2 winner over hurdles at Galway, and the best of four winning offspring of Suparoli (Super Sam).

Bowe’s stars are

recalled on the double

THE Bowe family members were the darlings of Irish racing for many years, enjoying great success with horses they bred and raced, most notably the multiple Grade 1 winners Solerina (Toulon) and Limestone Lad (Aristocracy). Both of these featured in the pedigrees of recent winners.

The six-year-old Linden Arden (Jet Away) is owned and was bred by John Bowe, and he was placed over hurdles when in the care of his brother Michael. Now with Willie Mullins, he opened his winning account at Punchestown on Monday, and thus became the fourth successful offspring of Solerina, all by different sires. Winner of a bumper and three flat races, Solerina garnered five Grade 1 victories among 18 career wins over hurdles, and made the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle at Fairyhouse her own, being successful three times in the race.

Fayonagh

Solerina is a half-sister to Florida Coast (Florida Son), and the siblings often raced against each other. On one occasion they finished first and an eight-length second in the Hatton’s Grace. Another half-sister to the pair is the bumper winner Fair Ina (Taipan), and she bred the outstanding but ill-fated Fayonagh, winner of all but one of her six starts, and doing a rare thing when recording the Grade 1 Weatherbys Champion Bumper at Cheltenham and Punchestown Champion Bumper double.

A listed handicap hurdle winner at the Dublin Racing Festival, Maxxum is the 44th blacktype winner over jumps (he also sired the Group 2 flat winner Never Forget) for the champion stayer Westerner. The son of Danehill (Danzig) won the Group 1 Ascot Gold Cup, and he landed two editions each of the Group 1 Prix du Cadran and Prix Royal-Oak.

Westerner’s second crop contained the Cheltenham Grade 1 Arkle Chase winner Western Warhorse, and that son of an Anshan (Persian Bold) dam would have encouraged others with mares by Anshan to cover them with the Coolmore National Hunt stallion. Maxxum, owned and bred by Patrick Rabbitt, is the fourth blacktype winner from that cross, joining Grade 2 chaser winner Castlebawn West and listed chase winner Kupatana.

Maxxum and his Grade 3 runner-up full-brother Magnium (Westerner) are the two winners to date for Anshan Bay (Anshan), and this mare has single-handedly rejuvenated a quiet branch of her female line. Anshan Bay’s dam didn’t breed a winner, her grandam was responsible for one, but her third dam, the unraced Limestone Miss (Raise You Ten), produced Limestone Lad.

Limestone Lad compiled the remarkable record of winning a pair of bumpers, 29 hurdle races and four chases. Three of his four Grade 1 wins over hurdles were, like Solerina, gained in the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle at Fairyhouse. He also won the Grade 2 Morgiana Hurdle three times and the Grade 3 Christmas Hurdle twice, and both races are nowadays Grade 1s. Over fences his biggest win came in the Grade 3 The Irish Field Chase at Punchestown.

No connection

Though he has no connection to the Bowe story, I cannot leave this week’s column without a mention of the only other winner at the Dublin Racing Festival that was bred in Ireland. Credited to the Northern Bloodstock Agency Ltd, the 11-year-old Lord Erskine (Fast Company) was winning for the eleventh time, and took his earnings to more than €280,000 from 54 starts.

Once purchased as a yearling by John Ferguson for 55,000gns, Lord Erskine cost Brian Grassick Bloodstock just 5,500gns as a three-year-old. What a sound investment that proved to be. He is the only winner for his unraced dam Lindoras Grace (Galileo), and take a look at the depreciation she took in value, going from a €220,000 yearling to a 4,500gns three-year-old, purchased latterly by Northern Bloodstock Agency.

Lindoras Grace had a single winning sibling, the listed winner and group-placed Linas Selection (Selkirk), and they are out of the US Grade 3 winner Lines Of Beauty (Line In The Sand). She won a total of nine races, two less than her multiple stakes-winning half-sister Superduper Miss (Robyn Dancer), while their half-sister Speedy Chris (Bet Big) won 10 times.

Being a prolific winner, as Lord Erskine is, is something of a family trait. His fourth dam, Moa (My Gallant), was a stakes winner of seven races, and all of her five winners were successful more than once.

The best of these, four-time stakes winner Super Doer (Skip Trial), won on 10 occasions.