THERE was no shortage of Group and Grade 1 races around the world on the flat during the past 10 days, and at a time of the year when coverage of the sport tends to focus almost entirely on National Hunt action it is good to be able to devote so many column inches to high-class winners on the level.
Pride of place, for certain, goes to the Aidan O’Brien-trained Warm Heart (Galileo) who capped a fine racing career on her final start with success in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf. This was a fitting end to an 11-race career that saw her win six times, bring home some £1.75 million in earnings, and all of this after she was beaten into fourth on her only start as a two-year-old at Dundalk.
Warm Heart’s nine starts last year yielded victories in a maiden at Leopardstown, a listed race at Newbury, the Group 2 Ribblesdale Stakes at Royal Ascot, and wins in the Group 1 Yorkshire Oaks and Prix Vermeille. She put up a great effort and was only denied a neck by Eclipse Award winner Inspiral in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf, before finishing third in the Group 1 Hong Kong Vase. She rounded off her racing career with victory at Gulfstream Park at the weekend.
The Coolmore-bred Warm Heart is out of Sea Siren (Fastnet Rock) who was a three-time Group 1 winner in Australia before she made her way to Royal Ascot to run in the Group 1 Diamond Jubilee Stakes, finishing eighth. She then changed trainers, leaving John O’Shea and joining Aidan O’Brien. Sea Siren was off the track for more than a year, but won a listed race at Fairyhouse and placed in a pair of Group 3 races, all her starts from Ballydoyle.
In Australia, Sea Siren won the six-furlong Group 1 BTC Cup, the seven-furlong Group 1 Doomben, and the six-furlong Group 1 Manikato Stakes. In addition to Warm Heart, she is the dam of three other winners, all by Galileo, and they include the pattern-placed Celestial Object. Sea Siren’s two-year-old of 2023, Bremen (Galileo), was a winner on his second start.
Excellent producer
Sea Siren has three stakes-winning siblings, Group 3 winner Oratorio (Stravinsky) and listed winner Discorsi (Galileo) among them. She can also list the New Zealand Group 2 winner Lady Dehere (Dehere) as a half-sister, and that mare has proven herself to be an excellent producer, responsible for the dual Group 2 winner Oracy (Zabeel) and the stakes-winning pair of Lady Maroal (Power) and The Lady (Stravinsky). The listed-placed Ruthless Lady (Keeper) is another of Lady Dehere’s daughters, and she is the dam of Group 1 Robert Sangster Stakes winner Ruthless Dame (Tavistock).
Sea Siren’s dam was the unraced Express A Smile (Success Express), an own-sister to a stakes winner. Their dam was a leading juvenile in Australia, Hold That Smile (Haulpak), who went on to win the Group 1 Karrakatta Plate. She, in turn, was a full-sister to dual Group 2 winner Carry A Smile (Haulpak).
Warm Heart is one of eight stakes winners bred on the Galileo/daughter of Fastnet Rock cross, and that list also includes Russian Emperor, the outstanding Hong Kong runner who won three Group 1 races. Sea Siren has a yearling colt by Camelot (Montjeu) born to southern hemisphere time, a colt foal by Coolmore’s dual Group 1 winning stallion, Home Affairs (I Am Invincible), and has been covered by St Mark’s Basilica (Siyouni).
National Treasure
Bob Baffert is the first trainer to win the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Invitational three times. The equine National Treasure, the Grade 1 Preakness winner last year, dug deep for victory in the $3 million race, the richest of the year at Gulfstream.
The victory reversed a four-race slide for National Treasure who won the Preakness and then was sixth in the Belmont, fifth in the Travers, fourth in the Awesome Again and second in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile.
This was a third win in 11 starts for the son of leading sire Quality Road (Elusive Quality). His juvenile form had seen National Treasure run second in the Grade 1 American Pharoah Stakes at Santa Anita and third in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Keeneland. His earnings now exceed $3.3 million, and National Treasure has more than repaid the $500,000 investment made in him as a yearling at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Yearling Sale.
Bred by Peter E Blum Thoroughbreds, National Treasure was selected at Saratoga by bloodstock agent Donato Lanni. He is one of five runners from Treasure (Medaglia D’Oro), four of them being winners. They include the stakes winner Ultimate (Speightstown), and also Pirate (Omaha Beach). The last-named won at two last year and ran third in the Group 1 Hopeful Stakes.
Treasure failed to win, in spite of being kept in training for three seasons, though she was placed on six occasions. She is a half-sister to four US stakes winners, and all are out of the stakes-placed Proposal (Mt Livermore). That mare was an own-sister to Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed Multiple Choice (Mt Livermore), and a half-sister to the unraced Lady Godiva (Unbridled’s Song) who produced the Grade 1 Clark Handicap winner Leofric (Candy Ride).
National Treasure is one of 15 Grade 1 winners for his Lane’s End sire who is set to cover this year again at $200,000.
Frankel again
Measured Time (Frankel) won three of his four starts last year in Britain, and suffered his only defeat on the last of those runs, comfortably beaten by Lion’s Pride in a four-runner listed race at Kempton. He has been transformed since heading to the UAE for the winter and is unbeaten in two outings there, landing the Group 2 Al Rashidiya Stakes at Meydan before stepping up to add the Group 1 Jebel Hatta last week.
A Godolphin homebred, Measured Time is the 34th worldwide Group/Grade 1 winner for Banstead Manor’s Frankel (Galileo). He is the second top-level winner for his dam Minidress (Street Cry), joining his half-brother Rebel’s Romance (Dubawi) in that club. The six-year-old Rebel’s Romance is winner of 10 of his 16 starts, and showed that he was returning to form in December when he scored in a listed race at Kempton, the gelding’s first victory since the 2022 Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Turf.
In 2022 he made his breakthrough at the highest level in Germany where he won both the Group 1 Grosser Preis von Berlin and Preis von Europa. Measured Time and Rebel’s Romance are two of the four winners out of the stakes-placed Minidress. She is a daughter of Short Skirt (Diktat), successful in the Group 3 Musidora Stakes and St Simon Stakes, and purchased for Godolphin for 1,400,000gns after being placed in the Group 1 Oaks. Short Skirt’s best runner is Minidress’s own-brother Volcanic Sky (Street Cry), a Group 3 winner at Meydan.
Hong Kong
In Hong Kong, Victor The Winner landed his first pattern success in the Group 1 Centenary Sprint Cup, and becomes the fifth such winner sired by the Group 1 Queen Anne Stakes and Sussex Stakes winner Toronado (High Chaparral).
Four of these are Australian-breds, the exception being the French-bred Tribhuvan. That gelding, from the first crop by Toronado, won both the Grade 1 Manhattan Stakes and United Nations Stakes in the USA.
Victor The Winner was gaining his seventh win in a dozen starts, and this six-furlong specialist gave quite a boost to the sale prospects of his yearling half-sister by I Am Immortal (I Am Invincible) at the upcoming Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale.
Cape Cross
He is the best of three winners for his stakes-paced dam Noetic, a daughter of Cape Cross (Green Desert). Cape Cross has enjoyed enormous success as a broodmare sire, and among the many stars produced by his daughters are Australia (Galileo), Masar (New Approach), Laurens (Siyouni), Tarnawa (Shamardal) and Tahiyra (Siyouni).
Victor The Victor was fourth in his only previous Group 1 race, the recent Longines Hong Kong Sprint, behind Lucky Sweynesse, Lucky With You, and Wellington.
He was runner-up in the Group 2 Jockey Club Sprint behind the world’s highest-rated sprinter Lucky Sweynesse who was only sixth in that race at the weekend.
You need to go back to the fourth dam of Victor The Winner to find another top-level winner in the family. Big Dreams (Great Above) was a stakes winner of 11 races in the USA and the best of her nine winning offspring was the dual US champion sprinter Housebuster (Mt Livermore). Three of his 15 wins were in Grade 1 traces, the Vosburgh Stakes, Carter Handicap and Jerome Handicap.
A fairytale Kazakhstan win in Dubai
WHAT a story it is already that the $12,000 yearling purchase Kabirkhan is now a Group 1 winner, successful in the Al Maktoum Challenge at Meydan last Friday. The dream could even reach fantasy levels should the four-year-old contest and win the Group 1 Dubai World Cup.
The fact that a cheaply-bought son of California Chrome (Lucky Pulpit) would win at the highest level is not the best part of this story, rather that the colt should have run and won in Kazakhstan and Russia in his formative years. At two, Kabirkhan was undefeated in three starts in Kazakhstan, while last year he won all but one of his outings in Russia. His sole defeat was in the Russian Derby when he finished second.
Transferred to Doug Watson in the UAE, Kabirkhan caught the eye when winning on his debut this year, beating another import from Russia, but few would have predicted that next time out, and just two weeks later, he would beat an international field to win the first leg of the Group 1 Al Maktoum Challenge. He is, incredibly, the first winner at this level for Watson.
Bred by Kehner Thoroughbreds, Kabirkhan is one of three winners, all her living foals of racing age, out of the minor US stakes winner Little Emily, a daughter of Castledale (Peintre Celebre).
Bred by Gigginstown House, Castledale was a consistent, if fairly average, juvenile when trained by David Wachman, winning a Gowran Park nursery before finishing his first season by running second in the Listed Blenheim Stakes at the Curragh.
Castledale
Transferred to Jeff Mullins in the USA, Castledale started the following season with an upset victory in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby, but finished well down the field in the Kentucky Derby, won by Smarty Jones. He came back to his best at four and won a second Grade 1, the Shoemaker Breeders’ Cup Mile Stakes at Hollywood Park, before heading off to stud. He moved after three seasons to the southern hemisphere where he sired a couple of Group 3 winners.
Now the dam of a Group 1 winner, Little Emily was sold twice as a six-year-old, for $75,000 and then in foal for $85,000, on the latter occasion purchased by Kyle Kehner. A year ago at Keeneland she was sold to Jacob Sherman for a mere $1,000.
That is not a misprint! Barren to Omaha Beach (War Front) at the time of her most recent sale, Little Emily has a couple of more youngsters to race for her, two colts now of racing age, and with a decent cover this now 16-year-old mare could prove to be a lucky and lucrative investment for Sherman.
One thing about the progeny of Little Emily is that they take their racing well. With 10 wins in 11 starts, Kabirkhan is the best of her three successful offspring, while the others, Blunt Force (Mucho Macho Man) and Semi Sweet (Fort Larned), have each won on seven occasions.
Little Emily gained her only stakes win at the now defunct Fairplex Park in California, and is the sole blacktype winner among the seven winning progeny of Emily’s Charm (Dom Alaric), a stakes-placed winner in Canada.
California Chrome is now at stud in Japan, and Kabirkhan is just his second Group 1 winner, the other being Chromium in Chile. Horse of the Year twice in the USA, California Chrome was champion at three when he won both the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes, and two years later was the best older horse in the USA when his two Grade 1 wins there were only surpassed by his victory in the Group 1 Dubai Gold Cup.
South Africa’s weekend of class
KENILWORTH in South Africa played host to three Group 1 contests at the weekend, and there was a shock winner of the prestigious Cape Town Met.
Double Superlative was successful in the Group 1 Cape Guineas three years ago, was placed in the Group 1 Cape Derby, and in 2022 ran a close fourth in the Cape Town Met. He then suffered a serious tendon injury, resulting in an absence of almost a year and a half, but he has been steadily brought back to his best, and his weekend success was a vindication of all the care he received.
This was just Double Superlative’s third win, but the victory was an emotional one for his breeder Patricia Devine, whose husband recently died at the great age of 100 years. Double Superlative is one of four Group 1 and 17 stakes winners sired by Twice Over (Observatory), and that colt’s 12 wins were headed by two editions of the Group 1 Champion Stakes, in addition to successes in the Group 1 Juddmonte International and Eclipse Stakes.
Double Superlative is out of the Jet Master (Rakeen) mare Come Fly With Me. She didn’t manage to get a stakes win among her five triumphs, but was placed numerous times in pattern company. Come Fly With Me is one of four winners, all the foals out of Fly The Wind (Model Man), and the best was her full-sister Fly By Night (Jet Master) whose best win was in the Group 1 Clairwood Mercury Sprint.
Champion female
Rated Horse of the Year in South Africa last season, Princess Calla is one of that nation’s best-loved performers.
The daughter of Grade 1 Travers Stakes winner Flower Alley (Distorted Humor) was enjoying success for the fifth time at Group 1 level, running out a more than three-length winner of the Majorca Stakes. She has now won 12 times and been in the first three on 23 of her 27 starts.
From his North American crops, Flower Alley sired I’ll Have Another, hero of two legs of the Triple Crown, the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes, and three other Grade 1 winners, while in South Africa his other Group 1 heroine is the classic winner None Other.
The first four dams of Princess Calla have been producers of stakes winners. Her own dam Princess Royal (Captain Al) won the Group 2 Sceptre Stakes, also annexed by her daughter, and she was one of two stakes winners from the unraced Platinum Princess (Rakeen). Princess Royal came close to a Group 1 win when she was runner-up in the Allan Robertson Fillies Championship, but her half-sister Princess Victoria (Victory Moon) won that race, one of her four Group 1 triumphs.
Princess Victoria was the champion filly in South Africa at two and three, amassing 10 wins in her career. Her other Group 1 wins included the Cape Fillies’ Guineas. The 10 winners produced by Platinum Princess were all her runners.
Dead Certain
Thirty-five years ago Dead Certain was rated the second-best juvenile filly in England and Europe. That season she won the Group 1 Tattersalls Cheveley Park Stakes, Group 2 Lowther Stakes and the Group 3 Queen Mary Stakes, which would lead one to ask, what filly was better? The answer is Group 3 winner Negligent!
Dead Certain doesn’t feature too prominently in pedigrees these days, but she has re-emerged thanks to a Group 1 winner in South Africa.
Dyce has now won half of his 14 starts, and at the weekend he completed a full hand of stakes wins, adding the Group 1 World Pool Cape Flying Championship to previous victories at Group 2, 3 and listed level.
Dyce has also given his sire, Group 1 Cape Guineas winner William Longwood (Captain Al), his first winner at that level. Dyce is one of three winners from the Australian-born Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) mare Beshaayir who won in South Africa over a mile. Beshaayir is one of nine winners out of the five-furlong sprinter Sarkha (Danehill), the others including listed scorer Lehaaf (Excellent Art) and the group-placed Salsabeel (Elusive Quality).