THE Grade 1 Gran Corsa Siepi di Merano was run last Saturday and won for the second time by the Irish-bred Brog Deas. The now seven-year-old son of Arakan was successful in the race two years ago and he went on to capture the Grade 1 Gran Corsa Siepi di Milano. There then followed a long period of a year and a half off the track. It is understood that connections will attempt the double again.

Tyrone Molloy, a contributor to The Irish Field, bred Brog Deas and days before the latest victory he sold a Choisir half-sister for €9,000 in Part 2 of the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale. The purchaser was the British-based Italian bloodstock agent Federico Barberini. That filly is a half-sister to five winners and Brog Deas is easily the best of them.

Trained in Ireland as a young horse by Pat Flynn, Brog Deas was bought by his then trainer for €6,000 at the Goresbridge Breeze Up Sale in 2011. This was the same price that Molloy had received for the colt as a foal at Goffs.

Owned by Michael Hanrahan when he raced in Ireland, Brog Deas ran up a sequence of three wins as a three-year-old before adding a hurdle race success at Cork at the same age.

Sent to the Tattersalls Horses In Training Sale as a four-year-old, he was sold for 50,000gns to McKeever Bloodstock and headed to the Czech Republic where he is still trained today. He is now winner of a further six races over jumps there and in Italy.

Brog Deas is out of the Greensmith mare Whitegate Way who was placed once at three but has been a much more successful broodmare. She has mated especially well with Ballyhane Stud stallions – having almost exclusively visited Joe Foley’s stud.

In addition to Brog Deas she is the dam of a pair of winners each by Pyrus and Rossini, while her four-year-old son Estrenar, by Dandy Man, looks sure to win. She has a three-year-old Arakan gelding that missed his turn at the Derby Sale but sold at Tattersalls Ireland’s August Sale for €16,500.

Whitegate Way’s dam Lady Longmead won over hurdles and was placed over fences but both of her winners were successful in blacktype races on the flat. Lord Smith, an own-brother to Whitegate Way, won six times as a two-year-old in England when trained by Bill Turner and Martin Pipe, and then added five more victories in the USA as a four-year-old, three of them in stakes races.

Lord Smith’s biggest win was in the Grade 2 Arcadia Handicap at Santa Anita and he also won the Grade 3 Explosive Bid Handicap at Fair Grounds. In all he was successful 11 times, three more than the number of wins achieved by his Averti half-brother The Lord, winner of a listed race at Goodwood a decade ago for trainer Bill Turner and jockey John Egan.