THE classic-placed and pattern-winning filly Matilda Picotte romped home in the Group 2 Thoroughbred Industry Employee Awards Challenge Stakes at Newmarket last week, and in so doing provided a timely example of her quality in advance of an appointment with the auctioneers in the opening session of the Goffs November Breeding Stock Sale on Friday, November 24th.

Trained by Kieran Cotter for the Matilda and Kilmichael Racing Partnership, she will be consigned at the sale by Clonanny Bloodstock. Thought trained in Ireland, the three-year-old enjoys travelling and has always reserved her best performances for her excursions to Britain. Matilda Picotte won the Listed Bosra Sham Stakes at Newmarket at the end of her two-year-old campaign, and returned there in May for the Group 1 1000 Guineas where she placed behind Mawj and Tahiyra, both multiple Group/Grade 1 winners since.

Subsequent runs saw the daughter of Sioux Nation (Scat Daddy) finish fourth in the Group 2 Sandy Lane Stakes at Haydock and a half-length second in Tipperary’s Group 3 Fairy Bridge Stakes, before putting in an excellent performance to win the Group 3 Sceptre Stakes at Doncaster. Making every yard of the running, she quickened clear to win by almost four lengths over a high-class field that included last year’s 1000 Guineas winner Cachet.

Out of the multiple stakes-placed winner Hallie’s Comet (One Cool Cat), who has produced five winners from six runners to date, Matilda Picotte’s juvenile season also included placings in the Group 2 Airlie Stud Stakes at the Curragh and Group 2 Lowther Stakes at York.

Best runner

Some way the best runner produced by Hallie’s Comet, Matilda Picotte will remain in training next year if she is not sold in November, as her trainer believes she is well capable of becoming a Group 1 winner. The form of her classic run, and her subsequent efforts, would indicate that she has a real chance of doing so.

Hallie’s Comet is among six winners out of the US winner Secretariat’s Tap (Pleasant Tap). The best of them all was Along Came Casey (Oratorio), a listed winner at Leopardstown and Gowran Park for Dermot Weld. In turn, she is the dam of Group 3 Darley Stakes winner Feliciana De Vega (Lope De Vega), and that mare’s first offspring, a yearling colt by Sea The Stars (Cape Cross), sold recently at Newmarket to Godolphin for 625,000gns.

Skip back to Matilda Picotte’s fourth dam Prospector’s Fire (Mr Prospector), and she is dam of two Group/Grade 1 winners. Dowsing (Riverman) won the Haydock Sprint Cup, and this was a few years before his sibling, Fire The Groom (Blushing Groom), was victorious in the Beverly D Stakes. At stud, Fire The Groom was no less a success and her best runner was Stravinsky (Nureyev), winner of both the Group 1 July Cup and Group 1 Nunthorpe Stakes.

Matilda Picotte is from the first crop of Coolmore’s Sioux Nation, winner of the Group 1 Keeneland Phoenix Stakes at two. She is one of the stallion’s 11 stakes winners.