WITH a winner’s purse of over £1.7 million, the Group 1 Ladbrokes Cox Plate at Moonee Valley over the weekend was a great racing highlight. For many, it is Australia’s most prestigious race, while the Melbourne Cup is the most famous.

The dozen starters contained many household names, but in a blanket finish it was one of the three Irish-bred horses in the line-up who prevailed by a whisker. The five-year-old Romantic Warrior won for the 11th time in 16 starts, and took his career winnings to a breath-taking €9,775,837.

On the five occasions he failed to pass the post in front, he was runner-up three times, never beaten more than a length, and fourth twice.

When Romantic Warrior won the Group 1 Longines Hong Kong Cup last December, I wrote that he was destined for greatness. At that time his racing career had met with a single setback, but it was a though I put a hex on him. His remaining four starts of that Hong Kong season saw him win the QEII Cup for the second time and finish second three times, twice to Golden Sixty, and when he went down by a neck at long odds-on to Russian Emperor.

Off the track from the end of April until the start of last month, Romantic Warrior made his reappearance at Flemington in the Group 1 Turnbull Stakes, finishing just outside the top three, but at the weekend he rectified that wrong, and took the Australian feature. He is the second horse trained in Hong Kong to win a Group 1 race in Australia, and this was the gelding’s fourth top-level success in all.

Bred in Co Kildare by the Egan family’s Corduff Stud and the octogenarian American Tim Rooney, Romantic Warrior (Acclamation) equalled the feat of another Irish-bred superstar, Designs On Rome, when he added the Hong Kong Cup to an earlier Hong Kong Derby success. At that time, winning rider James McDonald said “he’s right up there with any of the other really good ones I’ve ridden.”

David Egan

The reins at Corduff Stud are now in the hands of David Egan, son of James and Mercedes, and he is joined in the task of steering the stud’s success by his wife Henrietta. Co-breeder Tim Rooney has been a family friend for many years, and he also has had other Irish bloodstock connections and interests.

Romantic Warrior was selected from the Corduff Stud draft by Michael Kinane on behalf of the Hong Kong Jockey Club in his first season as their selector. Then a colt, he realised 300,000gns in Book 2 of the 2019 Tattersalls October Yearling Sale, on that occasion Kinane heading off a dogged opponent in Jake Warren.

In the immediate aftermath of the sale, Malcolm Bastard had the gelding for 10 months of breaking and preparation before Romantic Warrior headed to Manton after the HKJC changed some of their operations. Peter Lau purchased him at the HKJC International sale for the equivalent of €550,000. This was quite good value, given that a feature of public sales in Hong Kong is that the catalogue includes details of the pre-sale costs for all the lots, and €490,000 had been spent on Romantic Warrior until then.

Money back

Romantic Warrior is a son of Folk Melody (Street Cry), and the father and son team of James and David Egan, with Tim Rooney, bought her for €82,000 through Richard Brown of Blandford Bloodstock at Goffs, and quickly got their money back when the foal she was carrying, Melodic Charm (Exceed And Excel), sold for 85,000gns as a yearling. That filly won twice, and last December she sold to China Horse Club, in foal to Dark Angel (Acclamation), for 270,000gns.

At the time of her purchase, Folk Melody had a filly on the ground, Pennywhistle (Iffraaj), and after winning at two she was culled the following year for 130,000gns. Pennywhistle’s first produce is a two-year-old son of Saxon Warrior (Deep Impact), and she had a filly foal this year by Space Blues (Dubawi).

Folk Melody’s fourth produce is a three-year-old son, Operation Gimcrack (Showcasing) who has been placed on two of his four starts.

Operation Gimcrack’s failure to win yet may not have helped when Corduff offered his full-brother for sale this year. He is retained and plans are presently being considered for his future, while this year’s colt foal by New Bay (Dubawi) will be kept under wraps until next autumn. With no pregnancy this year, Folk Melody will be ready for covering as soon as the 2024 breeding season gets underway in the spring.

A Godolphin homebred, Folk Melody won a 16-runner maiden at Newmarket over seven furlongs at two, but failed to add further to that in four starts after transferring from Saeed bin Suroor to Charlie Appleby.

Resurgence

Romantic Warrior is spearheading a resurgence in this female line. Folk Melody is one of five winners from seven runners and 10 foals of racing age out of the Grade 1 E.P. Taylor Stakes winner Folk Opera (Singspiel). That Godolphin-owned mare also won the 2008 Group 2 Prix Jean Romanet, the last staging before it was upgraded to Group 1 status. The most recent winner out of Folk Opera is the three-year-old Folk Star (Le Havre).

After her retirement to the paddocks, Folk Opera visited Street Cry (Machiavellian) for her first two seasons at stud, and Folk Melody was born the year after her full-sister Opera Lily. The latter was trained by Kiaran McLaughlin but never ran, was sold in the summer of 2013 for a mere $20,000, and was later covered that year by Exchange Rate (Danzig).

The resulting colt, born in Argentina, was named Mr Bailetti, and his victories in Peru included the Group 1 Gran Premio Nacional Augusto B Leguia at three. Opera Lily has since produced a second stakes winner, this time in Argentina, in the form of Opus Alpha (Cima De Triomphe).

There is one other Group 1 winner that crops up in the first four generations of Romantic Warrior’s pedigree, and she is the Beat Hollow (Sadler’s Wells) filly Proportional. The best of her sex and generation at two in France after her victory in the Prix Marcel Boussac, Proportional is a stakes-producer at stud. Proportional’s own-sister Vote Of Ten (Beat Hollow) raced just five times, won the Group 3 Lodge Park EBF Park Express Stakes, and was placed in the Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas.

Their dam, the group-placed Minority (Generous), is a half-sister to Skiphall (Halling), the dam of Folk Opera, and that pair’s stakes-winning half-sister Innocent Air (Galileo) bred last year’s Group 3 Gallinule Stakes winner Hannibal Barca (Zoffany).

Most popular

Always one of the most popular sires with breeders in Ireland and elsewehere, the influential Acclamation (Royal Applause) is now 24. His fee this year was €27,500, and he covered a book of more than 60 mares at Rathbarry.

Though he is advancing in age, that has not stopped breeders of the highest quality from continuing to support this former leading sprinter, and the list of farms and individual who sent mares to him this year reads like a who’s who of the bloodstock world.

Little wonder that Acclamation continues to be popular. His sons include a plethora of successful stallions, such as Dark Angel and Mehmas, his daughters include the 6,000,000gns mare Marsha, a record that still stands, while he is the maternal grandsire of Group 1 winners Broome and Eqtidaar.