RIVALLING Bective Stud’s weekend of success, the former Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson had an ownership interest in four different winners over three days, one on the flat and the remainder at Cheltenham. When it comes to racing, Fergie still operates in the Premier League.

Pride of place goes to his homebred Spirit Dancer, winner of the Group 1 Bahrain International Trophy for the second successive year. The seven-year-old gelding has amassed winnings of more than £2 million and this is mostly thanks to his two wins in Bahrain, and success in this year’s Group 2 Neom Turf Cup in Saudi Arabia.

A consistent performer throughout his six seasons racing, Spirit Dancer raced under the radar until he hit a winning streak last year, landing handicaps at York and Windsor before returning to the Knavesmire for the Group 3 Strensall Stakes. Delighted with this latter win, trainer Richard Fahey discovered that the race gained the gelding an automatic place in the Bahrain International Trophy. For the second successive year, Spirit Dancer defeated a field that included three international Group or Grade 1 winners.

Ferguson bred Spirit Dancer with Niall McLaughlin, and races him with Ged Mason and Peter Done. He is the best of five winning offspring of the unraced Queen’s Dream, a daughter of Oasis Dream (Green Desert). The most recent is Road To Wembley (Postponed), and he raced for Ferguson alone and won three times this year from Richard Hannon’s yard.

Oasis Dream mares, covered by Frankel (Galileo), have proven to be a successful formula when it comes to unearthing quality runners. Last year it yielded its first Group 1 winner, Kelina in the Prix de la Foret at ParisLongchamp, while Spirit Dancer joins the Group 1-placed Obligate as the second Group 2 winner from the cross.

Biggest success

Queen’s Dream is an own-sister to two stakes winners, Querari (Oasis Dream) being the best of the pair. He won five times in Germany and Italy, and his biggest success was gained when he travelled to Rome for the Group 1 Premio Presidente della Repubblica. The other was Sharja Bridge (Oasis Dream), the Listed Doncaster Mile winner who was beaten half a length when runner-up in the Group 2 Sandown Mile.

Two more siblings of Queen’s Dream won stakes races, and another pair bred recent stakes winners. Queen’s Dream’s half-sister Quidura (Dubawi), a Grade 2 winner in the USA and Canada, was placed three times in Grade 1s, notably runner-up in the Diana Stakes at Saratoga. Sold to White Birch Farm for $3.6 million, her best produce is Jeff Koons (Frankel), and he won the valuable Listed Qatar Derby last year.

Meanwhile, back at Cheltenham, Sir Alex cheered home Potters Charm, Il Ridoto and L’Eau Du Sud to victory, in various different ownership groups. The winning streak started on Friday, the same day that Spirit Dancer was successful in Bahrain.

Twiston-Davies

Bred by Gerard Flynn, the five-year-old Potters Charm (Valirann) sold for €15,000 at the Goffs Land Rover Sale, finished second for the Happy Valley Syndicate in a point-to-point, and sold on for £105,000 to Willie Twiston-Davies at last year’s Tattersalls Cheltenham December Sale. Four months later, trained by his Willie’s father Nigel and ridden by his brother Sam, Potters Charm won a bumper at Ffos Las before being given a summer break.

Now, three wins over hurdles in three starts, Potters Charm is proving to be a most promising novice, and victory in the Grade 2 Hyde Novices’ Hurdle was his second win at Cheltenham. Hopefully these experiences will prove to be beneficial next March.

Given his progression, and reflecting the high regard the Twiston-Davies team has in him, Willie and Nigel spent €95,000 to buy his four-year-old half-brother, On Deadly Ground (Workforce), at the Goffs Punchestown Sale. Coincidentally, On Deadly Ground was also runner-up on his only start in a point-to-point, and like Potters Charm, he was trained by Michael Mangan. Lightening is definitely striking twice.

The success was a reminder of the recent passing of Ronnie O’Neill of Whytemount Stud, home to Potters Charm’s sire Valirann (Nayef). This is the stallion’s fourth blacktype winner over jumps, the others being Grade 2 winners Ballybawn Belter and Knappers Hill, and the Grade 3 chase winner Forward Plan.

Lord Who

Potters Charm’s unraced dam Autumn In New York (Shantou) is out of a half-sister to a pair of Grade 2-winning chasers, Measureofmydreams (Shantou) and Lord Who (Mister Lord). Their half-sister Glebe Beauty (Good Thyne), successful in a point-to-point, is the dam of Sutton Place (Mahler). A bumper and chase winner, Sutton Place won four hurdle races, two at Grade 2 level and one each at Grade 3 and listed status.

Twenty-four hours later, the French listed hurdle recruit L’Eau Du Sud (Lord Du Sud), won the Grade 2 novices’ chase at Cheltenham, while another French-bred, Il Ridoto (Kapgarde) won his second Grade 3 chase, the Paddy Power Gold Cup. The latter performs at his best at Prestbury Park.

Lord Du Sud was a smart stayer in France, and three of his 10 career victories were at Group 2 level, the Prix Vicomtesse Vigier, Prix Kergorlay and Pric Hocquart. His best runner to date has been Grandeur Nature, victorious in the Grade 1 Prix La Haye Jousselin Chase. While we are used to having Walk In the Park (Montjeu) mentioned as the sire of top-class winners, and sale headliners, here is a big race winner out of one of his daughters.

L’Eau Du Sud’s dam is Eaux Fortes, a three-time jumps winner and the daughter of Neriette (Vettori). She won four races on the level, but was more prolific over jumps, adding nine victories over jumps, four of them blacktype chases and hurdle races in France.

60 winners

Kapgarde’s tally of blacktype winners stands at 60, and one of these is Il Ridoto. He has some way to go to be in the same league as some of the stallion’s best, the likes of Brighterdaysahead, Fakir D’Oudairies, Clan Des Obeaux, A Plus Tard, and Milord Thomas. Il Ridoto has a pair of winning siblings, all out of the unraced L’Exploratrice (Trempolino).

There is a splattering of decent winners under both rules in France from the second and third dams, but none that resonate with too many people. Il Ridoto’s third dam Bresolles (Bourbon) was a listed flat winner, but her seven winning offspring are headed by El Triunfo (Ile De Bourbon), and 16 of his 20 visits to the winners enclosure came after jumps races, including the Grand Steeplechase de Paris. He was one of the most popular runners in the late eighties and early nineties.