YOU know you are getting older when you can remember a filly who was champion at three in France in 1977. I was a year into my working life when Madelia (Caro) won four races, three of them at the highest level. Owned and bred by Daniel Wildenstein, Madelia was trained by Angel Penna, Senior, and she was unusual in that she only even raced four times. She won the Poule d’Essai des Pouliches-French 1000 Guineas, Prix de Diane-French Oaks, and the Prix Saint-Alary.

At stud she had 10 foals, half of which won. Her daughter Moonlight Dance (Alysheba) also won the Group 1 Prix Saint-Alary, her son Claude Monet (Affirmed) gained his biggest success in the Group 2 Dante Stakes, while another son, Marignan (Blushing Groom), was runner-up in the Group 1 Prix du Jockey Club-French Derby.

Madelia’s descendants have won major races in Peru, India, Brazil and Japan, with few making their mark in Europe. The Japanese branch of the family was in the news when Vela Azul, a son of their Derby winner Eishin Flash (King’s Best), moved up from being a Group 2 winner to landing the hugely valuable Group 1 Japan Cup. He is the first winner at the highest level for his generally disappointing sire, responsible for just three stakes winner in six crops of racing age.

Vela Azul is no flash in the pan on the dam side of the pedigree. One of five winners for his winning dam Vela Blanca (Kerofune), he is the only one to earn any kind of blacktype. Vela Blanca, however, is a half-sister to two champions in Japan, the Group 1 Shuka Sho winner Aventura (Jungle Pocket), and her Oaks-winning own-sister Tall Poppy (Jungle Pocket).