LAST week I wrote in my Royal Ascot review that Dubawi had sired a landmark 150th group winner, after Eldar Eldarov was victorious in the Group 2 Queen’s Vase.

Now the classic-winning colt from the sole crop of Dubai Millennium (Seeking The Gold) has reached another milestone, and exactly one-third of those 150 group winners are, in fact, Group or Grade 1 winners. This follows Naval Crown’s win in one of the week’s most competitive races, the £1 million Platinum Jubilee Stakes.

Last year Dubawi’s son Creative Force beat Naval Crown in the Group 3 Jersey Stakes at Royal Ascot, but on Saturday the roles were reversed, with Naval Crown just getting the better of his old rival. The four-year-old Godolphin homebred Naval Crown held on for a neck triumph.

Winner of the Group 2 Al Fahidi Fort earlier this season at Meydan, Naval Crown was only running for the second time over six furlongs, and this was his fourth career win. He is the first foal out of the French stakes winner Come Alive (Dansili), and she has a two-year-old Lope De Vega (Shamardal) filly in training named Spring Promise, a yearling filly by Shamardal (Giant’s Causeway), a filly foal by Ghaiyyath (Dubawi), and is back in foal to Dubawi.

Exceptional year

Dubawi is having an exceptional year, with Naval Crown being his fourth Group 1 winner this season after classic heroes Coroebus (also a Royal Ascot winner) and Modern Games, plus Meydan scorer Lord North. Dubawi had a fantastic 2022 Royal Ascot with five winners.

Naval Crown’s dam Come Alive is the only stakes winner, among six successful offspring, from the listed winner and group-placed Portrayal (Saint Ballado). Another of that mare’s daughters, Belle Boyd (Oasis Dream), was stakes-placed.

The Group 3 winner, and influential matriarch, Truly Special (Caerleon), is Naval Crown’s fourth dam, and he is one of at least half a dozen Group 1 winners in this family.

Far from disgraced when tackling a mile in the Group 1 2000 Guineas, the Tally-Ho Stud-bred three-year-old Perfect Power reverted to sprinting and was most impressive when landing the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup last Friday.

Sixth success

This was a sixth success for the son of Ardad (Kodiac), half of them being gained at the highest level. At two he won the Middle Park Stakes in Newmarket and the Prix Morny in Deauville. He is by some way the best of the four stakes performers to date from his sire’s first crop.

Standing at Overbury Stud, Ardad was himself a Royal Ascot winner, successful in the Listed Windsor Castle Stakes. Later that season he added the Group 2 Flying Childers Stakes when he beat the Group 1 winner The Last Lion. At three he failed to add to his record.

Ardad was also bred by Tally-Ho Stud and sold for £170,000 to Blandford Bloodstock as a yearling. His son Perfect Power is the first foal from the dual winner Sagely, a daughter of Frozen Power (Oasis Dream). She was purchased by the O’Callaghans for 42,000gns and Tony sent her to Ardad. Having failed to sell the resulting colt as a yearling for 16,000gns, O’Callaghan breezed him and was rewarded when he made £110,000 at Goffs UK, where he was also purchased by Blandford.

Standout

Sagely’s three-parts sibling, Margaret Elizabeth (Kodiac), sold last year for €230,000 and is in training with Bryan Smart, though yet to run, while there is a yearling colt by Galileo Gold (Paco Boy) in Co Westmeath. Perfect Power is the standout in his branch of a very successful female line that goes back to his fourth dam, Saganeca (Sagace). A Group 2 winner in France, and Group 1-placed in Italy, she sold to John Magnier as a 15-year-old for $2 million.

At the time she was dam of a pair of Group 1 winners, the Arc winner Sagamix (Linamix) and the Arc-placed Sagacity (Highest Honor). Three of her daughters have bred Group 1 winners, and notable among that trio is the great, and recently deceased, Shastye (Danehill), dam of Japan and Mogul, both sons of Galileo (Sadler’s Wells).