THE first yearlings are about by My Dream Boat (Lord Shanakill) and this Group 1 winner at Royal Ascot stands at Starfield Stud near Mullingar, Co Westmeath. He won six races in his four seasons in training, with his Timeform rating rising to 124 in Racehorses of 2016.

At three he won four times, twice in France in the Listed Prix du Ranelagh at Chantilly and then the Group 3 Prix Perth at Saint-Cloud, both over a mile. My Dream Boat improved even more as a four-year-old, winning the Group 3 Gordon Richards Stakes at Sandown Park in April, defeating the previous year’s winner Western Hymn, and then at Royal Ascot in June he won the Group 1 Prince of Wales’s Stakes over a mile and a quarter from the brilliant filly Found, whom he beat by a neck, with Western Hymn and The Grey Gatsby third and fourth more than three lengths away.

My Dream Boat finished ahead of Highland Reel and Harzand in the Irish Champion Stakes before a fast finishing fourth to Almanzor, Found and Jack Hobbs in the Group 1 Champion Stakes at Ascot, ahead of The Grey Gatsby. In 2017 My Dream Boat was second in the Group 3 Aston Park Stakes at Newbury, third to Ulysses in the Group 3 Gordon Richards Stakes and fourth to Zarak in the Group 1 Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.

My Dream Boat is the best winner sired by the Group 1 Prix Jean Prat hero Lord Shanakill (Speightstown), while his dam is a winning half-sister to Group 2 winner and Group 1 producer Optimistic Lass (Mr Prospector). My Dream Boat’s fee for 2020 is €2,500.

FINSCEAL Fior stands at Green Hills Stud in Kilmacthomas, Co Waterford. Injury denied him the chance of a racing career, but as a son of the phenomenal Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) and out of the dual classic-winning miler Finsceal Beo (Mr Greeley) it was no surprise that he went to stud. His eldest crop are only six-year-olds and his number of runners is still quite small. However, he has done very well and has the potential to get blacktype winners under both codes.

The bulk of the Galileo stallions are flat sires and a growing double-digit number have at least one top-level winner already, including Frankel, Nathaniel (also sire of the 2020 Cheltenham stars Burning Victory and Concertista), New Approach, and Teofilo. Mahler and Soldier Of Fortune are leading the way among his National Hunt sons.

Finsceal Fior’s first crop includes the talented Annie Fior, a four-time flat winner who finished third to Red Tea and Goddess in the Group 2 Kilboy Estate Stakes at the Curragh last summer. She is best from seven to nine furlongs but also stays 10. The Amanda Perrett-trained Double Legend won again over 12 furlongs at Kempton this year, Minnie Dahill has won on the flat and over hurdles, and juvenile hurdler Sacchoandvanzetti won at Galway and Punchestown.

Dewcup is also of note. The lightly-raced gelding has won bumpers at Thurles and Punchestown by a combined margin of seven lengths, he missed out on blacktype when fourth to McFabulous in the Grade 2 bumper at Aintree last year but gained some when third in a listed bumper at Navan on his most recent start. All of this has been from small crops, and the half-brother to Group 2 scorer and young stallion Ol’ Man River (Montjeu) looks value at his fee of just €1,000.

Finsceal Fior’s dam was rated the best of her sex in Europe at two when she won the Group 1 Prix Marcel Boussac. She then came agonisingly close to winning three classics, failing at the final hurdle to add the Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Pouliches-French 1000 Guineas to the Group 1 1000 Guineas and Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas.