ALMOST unnoticed, the three-year-old colt Tito Mo Cen kept his unbeaten record when winning the nine-furlong Listed Prix Maurice Caillault on the all-weather at Chantilly last weekend. Victoria Head trains him for owner-breeders Yeguada Centurion, and the colt has a number of classic entries.

An Irish-foaled son of Uncle Mo (Indian Charlie), Tito Mo Cen possesses a classic pedigree, and the credentials to eventually make a stallion. He continues to reward his breeder, the Spanish-based Leopoldo Fernandez Pujals, who spent $300,000 to acquire his dam Raven’s Lady (Raven’s Pass) at Keeneland in 2019, at the end of her racing career.

Raven’s Lady was bred by Rabbah Bloodstock but they sold her as a yearling for 38,000gns to Jamie Lloyd. She was trained and raced frequently by Marco Botti, making 18 starts for the stable. She won in each of the three seasons she spent with Botti, highlighted by a Group 3 win at York and taking the Group 2 Goldene Peitsche at Baden-Baden on her penultimate run for connections, later being sold to continue her career in the USA.

That change of scenery, which so often leads to even greater glory, resulted in just a single further win. Having been retained for 350,000gns as a four-year-old, Raven’s Lady was sold a year later for a lesser sum. Sent to Ashford for her first year at stud, Raven’s Lady produced a filly, Ramatuelle (Justify), and what a star she proved to be. Arthur Hoyeau and others bought her as a yearling at Arqana for €100,000, and she went on to be one of the best of her generation at two and three.

All of Ramatuelle’s four wins were in France, headlined by the Group 1 Prix de la Foret last October, and including the Group 2 Prix Robert Papin and Group 3 Prix du Bois at two. She has three Group 1 placed efforts to her credit, in the Prix Morny when she was second, and when third in both the 1000 Guineas and Coronation Stakes. Ramatuelle’s racecourse exploits resulted in her sale to M.V. Magnier last November for $5.1 million, the second highest price at that Fasig-Tipton sale.

Offered from the consignment of Bedouin Bloodstock, and having been a late scratching from the Breeders’ Cup, Ramatuelle was still offered for sale as a racing and broodmare prospect, but in the immediate aftermath of her purchase Magnier revealed that his new acquisition would visit Wootton Bassett (Iffraaj) in 2025.

Near champion

Having produced a near champion with her first foal, and a now unbeaten stakes winner with her second, connections will have much to look forward to when Raven’s Lady’s third produce, the two-year-old colt Mr Lope Cen (Lope De Vega), hopefully hits the track this year. It is great to see this branch of a well-known family revitalised after a slight period of quiet. Raven’s Lady is a daughter of the unraced Pivotal Lady (Pivotal), the only one of Tito Mo Cen’s first four dams not to have been successful in a stakes race.

Pivotal Lady is a half-sister to Best Of The Bests (Machiavellian), whose biggest success came in the Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan, while another of their siblings is Storming Sioux (Storming Home). She was placed a number of times, never managing to get her head in front, but she more than made amends when she produced the Group 3 winner and Group 1 Melbourne Cup runner-up Prince Of Arran (Shirocco).

Best Of The Bests was the best runner, among five winners, produced by the Group 3 Fred Darling Stakes winner Sueboog (Darshaan). That mare won or placed on all of her six starts, and she was one of a trio of blacktype winners out of Nordica (Northfields), herself a listed winner at Naas. Those three stakes winners, among nine winning offspring out of Nordica, were all fillies, and all of them later bred at least one stakes winner.

Group 1 winner

Though Sueboog got a Group 1 winner, her half-sister Marika (Marju) has put three stakes winners on the pedigree page. While they may not be household names, it is a fair performance nonetheless. Kick On (Charm Spirit) won Group 3 races in England, Sweden and Norway, Raw Impulse (Makfi) is a stakes winner in Australia, while Sabratah (Oasis Dream) is a dual listed winner in France. Other members of this family came close to providing success at the highest level. Shaanmer (Darshaan) was runner-up in both the Group 1 Grand Prix de Paris and Prix Jean Prat, while his half-sister Nordican Inch (Inchinor) occupied the same position in a Grade 1 at Belmont Park in the USA.

Soon after announcing that he would stand the 2025 season at Ashford Stud for $125,000, a fall from last year, it was announced that Uncle Mo had been euthanised. The champion juvenile of 2010, when he was undefeated and won both the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes and Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, his second season was interrupted by illness. Uncle Mo was forced to miss the Kentucky Derby, but he did sire the winner of that classic in his first crop, Nyquist in 2016.

Uncle Mo is certain to add many more winners to his sire record, and this year’s two-year-olds are members of his eleventh crop. His tally of Grade 1 winners stands at 14, all of whom gained their wins in the USA. Could his son Tito Mo Cen add his name to that list this season? He is certainly a horse to watch closely.