BRED in France by Jean Contou-Carrère and Yves Broca, Pic D’Orhy went one better than last year and brought his winning total to 13 in the Grade 1 Betfair Ascot Chase, his second victory at the highest level. Three of the four runners in the race carried the French suffix.

Last April, the Paul Nicholls-trained son of Turgeon (Caro) won the Grade 1 Marsh Melling Chase at Aintree, and a repeat of that win is now the target for the nine-year-old.

Originally raced in France where he won three times over hurdles and chased home Beaumec De Houelle (now at stud in France) in the Grade 1 Prix Cambacérès Hurdle at Auteuil, Pic D’Orhy won once more over the smaller obstacles in England. This was in the valuable Grade 3 Betfair Hurdle at Newbury.

It has been over fences that Pic D’Orhy has shone, and his roll of honour also includes the Grade 2 Peterborough Chase, a couple of Grade 2 chases at Ascot, and the Grade 2 Silviniaco Conti Chase at Kempton, a race in which he finished second on his penultimate start. Pic D’Orhy is from a family that in every generation throws up a good horse.

A daughter of Roli Abi (Bering), the unraced Rose Candy has been quite a revelation as a broodmare. While the weekend Grade 1 winner is her star, she has produced five winners with her first six foals, the placed Arthur Junior (Le Triton) being the only one to blemish her record. Two of Pic D’Orhy’s siblings have also earned blacktype when placed in listed races, four-time winner Éclair Gris (Fairly Ransom) in a chase at Pau, and Sainte Candy (Jeu St Eloi) over hurdles at Auteuil.

Offspring

The only offspring of Rose Candy that I can see having been sold at public auction is the three-year-old Kiptanuy (Jeu St Eloi), and he realised €41,000 as a yearling. The two-year-old filly Diva Nirvana (Nirvana Du Berlais) and the yearling colt Grand Horizon (Bathyrhon) complete the list of Rose Candy’s progeny to date.

Sainterose (Saint Estephe), the grandam of Pic D’Orhy, is an unraced half-sister to Bonbon Rose (Mansonnien) and Rose Beryl (Lost World), more of them later, and she bred a couple of minor winners. However, she is best-known as the grandam of Irish Saint (Saint Des Saints), a listed hurdle winner in France who went to England and won three times at Grade 2 level, twice over hurdles and once over fences, and was placed a few times at Grade 1 standard.

A daughter of Master Thatch (Thatch), Pic D’Orhy’s third Rose Angevine won 10 races over jumps in France and was rewarded for her efforts and consistency with a victory in the Listed Grand Chase d’Angers, run at the course of the same name. Her placed efforts numbered among them being third in the Grand Steeplechase de Nantes.

Blacktype races

Two of the four winners from Rose Angevine won blacktype races and the better of the pair was Bonbon Rose. He was purchased as a breeze-up horse at the Goffs France April Sale in 2005 for an incredible €240,000 and ended up earning more than £200,000 from eight victories over jumps in France as a young horse, notably landing the Grade 1 Prix Gras Savoye Ferdinand Dufaure Chase at Auteuil. He is the sire of the Galway Plate winner Ash Tree Meadow.

There is another Galway Plate connection to this family. If you want an example of toughness, look no further than to a son of the jumps winner Rose Beryl. When he won the 2018 Grade A thetote.com Galway Plate, Clarcam (Califet) was making the 47th start of his career, recording his 10th success in the process. He retired after running 50 times.

Prior to winning at Galway, Clarcam had annexed a pair of Grade 1 chases, namely the Racing Post Christmas Chase at Leopardstown and the Manifesto Novice Chase at Aintree, and he was placed on three other occasions at that level. He is the best of many winners for his dam Rose Beryl.

I WAS disappointed to miss, probably for the first time, the Connolly’s Red Mills day at Gowran Park on Saturday. I was 3,500 miles away in Doha for racing.

The day was an outstanding success from what I hear, and there were two worthy winners of the graded races sponsored by Red Mills on the card. In what was an emotional week for the Mullins family, Willie send Saint Sam out to land the Grade 2 Red Mills Chase, while Henry de Bromhead’s Lantry Lady remained unbeaten after the Grade 3 Red Mills Trial Hurdle. The latter also has a pedigree and a half.

Both of the big race winners are by Saint Des Saints (Cadoudal) who features regularly in these columns. While Saint Sam was a previous blacktype winner, Lantry Lady was winning one for the first – and not the last – time.

Saint Des Saints is at Haras de la Tuilerie, having moved back and forth from Haras d’Etreham since he went to stud in 2003. His fee this year is €15,000, the price he has commanded since 2017. That shows what a success he has been.

Bred by Patrick Chedeville, Lantry Lady is blacktype winner number 94 for Saint Des Saints, and the Mariga family have a readymade broodmare in due course with the six-year-old. This was only the mare’s second start, eleven months after she won at the same venue. Cheltenham is now a possibility for Lantry Lady, a course that has been lucky – and unlucky – for her family.

Anna’s Star

The dam of Lantry Lady, the unraced Anna’s Star (Hernando), is a half-sister to none other than Annie Power (Shirocco), the Grade 1 Champion Hurdle winner at Prestbury Park. Annie Power has been in the news again recently thanks to her Grade 2-winning son Mystical Power (Galileo). While she boasts of such a great sibling, Anna’s Star is progressing nicely as a broodmare.

One person who will have been thrilled with Lantry Lady’s success is Nicola FitzGerald. She paid €26,000 for Anna’s Star in 2021 on behalf of her brother, Randox founder Peter, and the mare was carrying the now two-year-old filly Aine (The Grey Gatsby). Mind you, it was a leap of faith by Nicola, as the 11-year-old had only produced one runner, and he wasn’t up to much.

Now Anna’s Star is the dam of a blacktype winner, two winners and a placed horse, and she has a three-year-old gelding Lucky Du Large (Pastorius) in the wings.

Saint Sam won a couple of times in France before coming to Ireland. He won once over hurdles here and his victory on Saturday was his fifth over fences. Also a Grade 3 winner at Killarney, success at graded level is surely befitting a gelding who was runner-up at Grade 1 level over hurdles and chased Jeff Kidder home in the Grade 3 Fred Winter Hurdle at Cheltenham. Saint Sam was bred by a partnership that included Victoria Dubois and Irene Catsaras.

Ladeka

Saint Sam is one of a pair of winners, with more surely to come, out of the winning Linda’s Lad (Sadler’s Wells) mare Ladeka. She was second in a Grade 3 hurdle race at Auteuil and placed in many listed races there. Ladeka is a half-sister to Sweet Dance (Kingsalsa), the victorious dam of We Have A Dream (Martaline) who was a Grade 1 hurdle winner at Aintree and Chepstow.

This is a female line that is equally at home producing Group and Grade 1 performers on the flat and over jumps. Ladeka’s winning half-sister Femme De Fer (Iron Duke) bred a pair of Grade 2 winners in the USA, both of which later went to stud there. Femme De Fer is also grandam of the 2013 Group 1 Premio Vittorio di Capua winner Shamalgan (Footstepsinthesand) and the Group 1 placed stakes winner Gabrial (Dark Angel). Go back one more generation and up pops the 2015 Grade 1 Punchestown Festival chase winner Blood Cotil (Enrique).