GEORGE Strawbridge is an internationally-known and hugely important owner and breeder, who has had great success with his runners on the flat in Europe and in the USA.

Just days before his 87th birthday this past week, he enjoyed the latest in a string of big race wins, when the John and Thady Gosden-trained Friendly Soul won the Group 1 Prix de l’Opera at ParisLongchamp.

That success is also a milestone in the history of thoroughbred breeding, as the winner, Friendly Soul (Kingman), is the fourth Group 1 winner produced by In Clover, herself a Group 3-winning daughter of Inchinor (Ahonoora). It now means that In Clover joins just 10 other mares in the history of the thoroughbred, who have bred four or more Group 1 winners around the world.

For that reason alone, Friendly Soul is the main lead in this week’s Breeding Insights column, ahead of even the wonderful Arc heroine Bluestocking.

Huge contribution

It was a delight to see George Strawbridge in person at ParisLongchamp to accept the trophies after Friendly Soul’s success, and it is fair to say that he has made a hugely significant contribution to both racing and breeding on both sides of the Atlantic, and probably doesn’t get the plaudits and full acknowledgement he truly deserves for what he has done. A place in any Hall of Fame would be well-earned.

Strawbridge serves on the board of directors of the Campbell Soup Company, which was founded by his grandfather, John Dorrance, and he has gained renown in many areas of life, as an educator, historian, investor, sportsman and philanthropist.

Racing as Augustin Stable, Strawbridge is the all-time leading jumps owner in North America, his runners recently passing the $55 million mark in winnings. Much of those earnings came from horses developed by Jonathan Sheppard, who has been his trainer for five decades.

Strawbridge’s top flat runners include US champions Forever Together (Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf), Informed Decision (Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint) and Waya, and the European champions Selkirk (also a successful sire), Silver Fling (Prix de l’Abbaye), Treizieme, Tikkanen and Turgeon. Hall of Fame member and two-time champion Café Prince tops the list of many great steeplechasers he has owned.

Given the limited numbers of horses he breeds and races, George Strawbridge has every right to be considered among the greatest breeders of the past century, and, to coincide with his 90th birthday, he will hopefully be racing, with success in 2027, a three-year-old full-brother to Friendly Soul, In Clover’s most recent offspring being born this spring.

The good news too is that In Clover is back in foal to Kingman. Could she yet join the super-select group of three mares, who have produced five Group/Grade 1 winners, Argentina’s Chaldee, Australia’s Eight Carat, or Juddmonte’s Hasili?

HATS off to Friendly Soul’s sire Kingman (Invincible Spirit), as the Prix de l’Opera winner Friendly Soul is the third Group 1 winner of 2024 for the Banstead Manor stallion. Not only that, but all three are fillies and from the same classic crop.

Elmalka won the highest-quality Group 1 1000 Guineas (beating Porta Fortuna, Ramatuelle and Tamfana), while Sparkling Plenty, who was third in the Opera to Friendly Soul, won the Group 1 Prix de Diane-French Oaks.

Prior to the emergence of Friendly Soul, her dam In Clover was already responsible for Group 1 winners Call the Wind (Frankel) and the full-sisters With You (Dansili) and We Are, and her nine winners from 13 foals include no fewer than seven stakes winners.

One of her foals was never named, two others placed, and just one runner failed to make any contribution on the racecourse. The latter, a daughter of Dubawi (Dubai Millennium), will surely rectify that omission in the breeding shed.

We Are gained her second and most important win in the Group 1 Prix de l’Opera, and placed in the same race a year later. Call The Wind was one of the best stayers in France, winning the Group 1 Prix du Cadran, a race in which he was runner-up and placed third. In keeping with family tradition; With You gained her sole Group 1 success in the Prix Rothschild and her many placed efforts at the highest level included running second in the Rothschild also.

Keeps delivering

This is a family that keeps on delivering, and it had another major boost last year when In Clover’s granddaughter Kelina (Frankel) won the Group 1 Prix de la Foret.

She justified the Wertheimer brothers making a 420,000gns investment in the filly’s dam, Incahoots (Oasis Dream), nine years ago. Then a three-year-old, Incahoots topped the first session of the 2015 Tattersalls December Sale, and the George Strawbridge-owned and bred filly had won once.

She was considered not far away from getting blacktype, and the Wertheimer brothers stated their intent at the time to pursue that aim. It was achieved at Cagnes-Sur-Mer at four.

Incahoots is an own-sister to the dual stakes winner and group-placed Dream Clover (Oasis Dream), yet they, along with the stakes winner in Crowd (Dubawi), are among the ‘lesser’ winners out of Strawbridge’s wonderful broodmare, In Clover. As a racemare herself, In Clover won the Group 3 Prix de Flore, the highlight of her four career victories.

Eight winners

In Clover’s dam Bellarida (Bellypha) was also a Group 3 winner, successful in the Prix de Royaumont at Longchamp.

Bellarida had eight winning offspring, three of whom were stakes winners, and she is grandam of the Australian Group 2 winner Adjusted (Montjeu), and Group 3 winner and Group 1 Matron Stakes runner-up, Lily’s Angel (Dark Angel).

Bellarida is the third dam of Dominant (Cacique), winner of the Group 1 Hong Kong Vase, classic heroine Teppal (Camacho), winner of the Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Pouliches-French 1000 Guineas, and the Group 1 Prix Jean Romanet winner Aristia (Starspangledbanner).

It is fair to say that, while the next two removes of the female line are far from poor, they contain nothing of the quality that has ultimately descended from Bellarida, who was the best of three winners from Lerida (Riverman).

That mare was also one of three winners from her dam, the Prix Saint-Alary heroine Lalika (Le Fabuleux). One of the latter’s daughters bred an Indian stakes winner.

However, this is a real case of a family coming back to prominence after missing out on a generation or two. Lalika’s victory in the Prix Saint-Alary did not earn her the accolade of being the best of the runners from Kalila (Beau Prince II). That honour falls to Roi Lear (Reform), the leader of his classic generation at three following his triumph in the Group 1 Prix du Jockey Club-French Derby.

Siblings to Lalika have also gone on to establish prolific branches of this family, with major winners in almost every corner of the world. Examples of these include the leading German colt Scalo (Lando), dual champion American runner Wise Dan (Wiseman’s Ferry), US Grade 1 winner Atticus (Nureyev), Italian Group 1 winner Dubai Surprise (King’s Best), Group 1 Prix Lupin winner Cudas (Seattle Song), and Argentine Group 1 winner Pataques (Catcher In The Rye).