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By Wandering Eyes · Posted
ASCOT, UK — There may be cause for concern when it comes to the tumbling number of foals bred in Britain but, with Ascot festooned with the Union Jack, the first three races represented a terrific result for the United Kingdom, falling to horses bred in England, Wales and Scotland. In front of the King and Queen, first Docklands then Gstaad and American Affair testified to the strength of Thoroughbreds produced in the country, with British-based Irishmen Richard Kent and John McGrandles being the breeders behind the first two Group 1 winners of the royal meeting. The pride of Mickley Stud, Docklands is by the farm's resident stallion Massaat and went one better than his second-place finish in last year's Queen Anne Stakes to lift the opening contest of Flat racing's biggest meeting and give trainer Harry Eustace his first Group 1 winner. As Eustace was engulfed in hugs by his parents James and Gay and brother and fellow trainer David, over from Hong Kong, a beaming Terry Henderson of OTI Racing followed Docklands in to the winner's circle, the globetrotting Australian syndicator bringing a welcome international feel to the day. But it was over in Shropshire that the winner's life began and, as his breeder Richard Kent leaned on the rail of the enclosure, his face a little higher of colour than usual, he accepted congratulations from Angus Gold. It was through Shadwell and Gold that the the 2,000 Guineas runner-up Massaat ended up at Mickley Stud and, as with any of the stallions Kent stands, he has had plenty of home support. Kent said, “I rang Harvey Bell yesterday with the list of horses and I have eight or nine Massaats who were going to the Autumn Sale but now I think they might have to have an upgrade – or I could keep a few and run them in next year's Windsor Castle!” He continued, “Genuine horses and genuine people never let you down. Go for a genuine horse and try to stick around as many genuine people as you can. We've two Massaat fillies who both ran yesterday and both were second and they both ran their hearts out. We went to Germany with a filly by him last year and she ran her heart out, and they are not the fanciest of pedigrees. My friend Liam Norris bought the dam Icky Woo for me and she wouldn't win a beauty contest but then she breeds us a genuine horse like this. It's all about their heart.” Docklands shares his birthplace with one of the hottest stallions around at the moment, Havana Grey, who was bred by Kent in partnership with the late Lady Caroline Lonsdale. Other notable recent Mickley graduates include G2 Temple Stakes winner Liberty Beach and G1 Irish St Leger winner Brown Panther for Michael Owen. “We used to breed jumpers and we went broke doing that so we went over to the sprinters,” Kent added. “Docklands was a beautiful horse and Adrian Costello is a very good judge and he bought him off me as a foal. Terry Henderson was keen to buy the horse because he had bought his half-brother Harbour Views, who was a very good horse down in Australia, by Le Havre.” Mickley Stud will be represented at Ascot again on Thursday as the breeder of London Boy (Havana Grey), who runs in the Norfolk Stakes for Amo Racing. 'This is history repeating itself' First blood in the two-year-old contests of the week went to Gstaad, the Starspangledbanner half-brother to dual Group 1 winner Vandeek, bred by Kelly and Huw Thomas at Maywood Stud in Wales. Their dam Mosa Mine (Exceed And Excel) was also a homebred and is now in foal to Wootton Bassett. Huw and Kelly Thomas, breeders of Gstaad | Emma Berry “I can't believe it – another one,” said Kelly Thomas after the Aidan O'Brien-trained colt had stormed to success in the Coventry. “The mare's at home now and I was just looking at her as I left. She's in the front paddock and is being kept a very close eye on.” She continued, “This is history repeating itself. Vandeek went out and won on his first run and then goes into a Group 2 on his second run and wins, and this lad has done just the same.” Gstaad was sold for 450,000gns to MV Magnier as a foal in the year of Vandeek's great triumphs at Newmarket and Deauville. Thomas, who keeps four mares at Maywood, added, “To have their support means so much. To think that our little stud can produce a horse who's in training at Ballydoyle. I took the mare over to Coolmore to be covered this year and whilst I was there I was lucky enough to go to see Gstaad in his stable. It's a privilege to go there.” Flower of Scotland Another couple enjoying a day they will never forget was John and Wendy McGrandles, the owner-breeders of American Affair. In becoming the first Group 1 winner for his sire Washington DC, he also provided Scottish trainer Jim Goldie with a first Group 1 as well as a first Royal Ascot winner in the King Charles III Stakes, and King Charles III himself was there to hand over the trophy to to the winning connections. The ownership group includes the trainer's wife Davina Goldie and David Gatherer. John McGrandles, left, and fellow owners with the King | Racingfotos “American Affair is probably the only horse here with a Glasgow postcode in his passport,” said John McGrandles. “Jim trained his dam, granddam and grandsire, and he gave me the mare but I only got two foals out of her. She was a super mare but sadly I never got a filly from her.” That mare was Classy Anne, whose sire was the erstwhile Goldie stable star Orientor. From the same crop of foals bred by the McGrandles came Copacabana, who races at the opposite end of the distance spectrum to American Affair and won a bumper for Willie Mullins earlier this year. “We breed them at home just about 10 miles outside Glasgow. We've always had horses – we've bred event horses and racehorses all our lives, but this is without doubt the best racehorse I've ever bred,” added McGrandles, who is off to another major event tomorrow to show some sheep at the Royal Highland Show. “Washington DC isn't popular but the reason that I went to him is that the mare was a very fast mare and I thought I would go to the fastest stallion that I could afford. We've sent another mare back to him this year and she is also by Orientor.” Both Massaat and Bearstone Stud's Washington DC, who stand not much more than a stone's throw from each other in Market Drayton, were available at £3,500 this year. They may not be the most sought-after of stallions, but at the most fashionable meeting of them all, their offspring showed that fashion counts for little as long as you have heart. The post Union Jack Flying High as Small Breeders Strike on the Big Stage appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Churchill Downs Inc., which owns and operates Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots, has reached an agreement with Louisiana horsemen for racing to continue at Fair Grounds from around Thanksgiving until early next spring.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
With significant, persistent rainfall in the local forecast for the next several days, the four turf stakes races carded for June 20 at Hollywood Casino at Penn National Race Course have been rescheduled for June 27.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
While it is neither the habit nor the place of this column to cite scripture, words that some of you may have heard last Sunday should resonate with everyone in this game: “Endurance produces character, and character produces hope.” Certainly we wouldn't have much of a business if the reverses we endure could not be parlayed into those attributes. We often refer to the Turf as “character-forming,” which always feels rather ambivalent. After all, we might easily find ourselves turning into quite unpleasant characters! But a persevering nature tends to be a winning one, whatever happens on the track, and plenty will duly be rooting for Albaugh Family Stables the day they nail that first Kentucky Derby. The prize that drives their investment has often shimmered on the horizon, only to dissolve into a mirage. Not This Time, probably their best candidate, had to be retired at two; but they have since won nearly all the principal trials, sending no fewer than seven into the Derby gate over the past decade, including third-placed Angel of Empire (Classic Empire) in 2023 and Catching Freedom (Constitution) who ran fourth the following year. Last fall it looked as though the Iowa-based program might have found another candidate in a colt named for its founder Dennis Albaugh. After a 'TDN Rising Star' maiden score at the home of the Derby, however, Admiral Dennis (Constitution) proved too slow a learner–especially leaving the gate–to earn adequate starting points from his rehearsals. Instead, he regrouped for a fresh start in the inaugural Delaware Derby last weekend, where he suggested that he may yet measure himself, later in the year, against some that did make the first Saturday in May. He certainly has the right shape to his pedigree, doubling down on the great Weekend Surprise (Secretariat): not just as fifth dam, but replicated in the same generation as mother of A.P. Indy, whose grandson Tapit is of course sire of Constitution. The dam of Admiral Dennis, Gulf Coast (Union Rags), represented a fifth generation bred by William S. Farish and various partners, tracing to the purchase of Weekend Surprise's dam Lassie Dear. But while Gulf Coast's dam and granddam, Sweet Success (Candy Ride {Arg}) and Aspiring (Seeking the Gold), both managed a place in the GIII Bourbonette Oaks on the Turfway synthetic, this particular branch of the dynasty had otherwise fallen rather fallow. Only with the next dam, A.P. Indy's half-sister Lassie's Legacy (Deputy Minister), do we find its customary quality: her daughter Happy Week (Distorted Humor), herself a useful stakes operator, produced GI Jockey Club Gold Cup winner Happy Saver (Super Saver). Gulf Coast was duly treated as the end of this particular line and sent to auction ($240,000 Keeneland September yearling/$300,000 OBS March). After surfacing in the colors of WinStar Farm, however, she showed plenty of ability in a curtailed career. Having won on debut, she ran second, first (Cash Run Stakes) and second in black-type company in her only remaining starts, all compressed between November and February. Whatever went awry then at least permitted an immediate covering by the farm's emerging star, Constitution, whose first sophomores had the previous year included Tiz the Law. The result is Admiral Dennis, who brought $425,000 as a September Book I yearling. So the mare has made a flying start–just like Constitution. Having last year broken into the top five of the general sires' list, he has now established himself as a six-figure cover with his upgraded books cycling through onto the track. Albeit himself produced from the home herd, Admiral Dennis belongs to Constitution's first crop at $85,000, up again from $40,000 after his first juveniles had elevated him from an opening $25,000. If anything, it feels surprising that he has only sired two Grade I winners since Tiz the Law, in Mindframe and Americanrevolution. (American Pharoah and Liam's Map, in the same intake, have seven and six respectively.) Constitution does have a whole bunch of elite winners in Chile, where his prolific early service might have unnerved some people after he mustered just two graded stakes winners in 2023. But his overall body of work, with 51 stakes winners and 102 such performers, remains commensurate with his fee at 6.9 and 13.8 percent of named foals. With that mare quality now fully in play, he continues to consolidate and currently stands sixth in the year-to-date table. Drift Gathering Momentum Catching Freedom, mentioned above, was the first Constitution yearling landed by the Albaugh family. While he remained unraced when they bought Admiral Dennis, he was evidently shaping well enough to offer plenty of encouragement (started hot favorite on debut just a couple of weeks after the sale). Both horses were bred by WinStar, who similarly excelled in finding the dam of Catching Freedom–as can be judged from the way the previous foal out of Catch My Drift (Pioneerof the Nile), the 5-year-old Bishops Bay (Uncle Mo), continues to make up for lost time. Having missed most of 2024, last weekend he won his fourth consecutive prize in the GIII Salvatore Mile. Catch My Drift was bought for $400,000 at Fasig-Tipton in November 2015, having won four of 10 starts including a 9f stakes at Saratoga, missing the GII Turnback the Alarm Handicap by just half-a-length. She was given due opportunity, but neither of her first two foals by Medaglia d'Oro and Tapit made the racetrack. Her third, Strava (Into Mischief), fortunately for his breeders failed to reach his yearling reserve and was instead sold at Keeneland for $825,000 after winning his juvenile debut on the adjacent track. While he did subsequently manage a couple of black-type places, he ended up being claimed for $32,000 last fall. Catch My Drift's success since, with Bishops Bay ($450,000 yearling) and Catching Freedom ($575,000), has little blatant provenance. We are familiar with the astuteness of her breeders Fred W. Hertrich III and John D. Fielding (who sold her to Hidden Brook as a yearling for $95,000), but in this case they are strictly only breeders of record: they bought her in utero along with her $85,000 dam at the 2010 Keeneland November Sale. That was Drift to the Lead (Yonagushka), who had taken seven attempts to break her maiden but then won three in four at Delaware Park. She had a half-sister by Pleasantly Perfect who won three stakes, but that did not prevent their mother, by Tabasco Cat, being discarded for just $6,500. It's only in the next dam that we finally find a nugget: besides her 11-for-48, stakes-winning speed in Florida, Sigrun (Crafty Prospector) came up with a graded stakes winner who then became one of three stakes-producing siblings. That's pretty remote already, however, so we'll resist dwelling on the fact that Catch My Drift's fourth dam is a stakes winner by Baldski–having only last week noted that largely forgotten name lurking behind Justify himself. A Wise Decision The registered breeders of Catch My Drift get full credit, however, for Whiskey Decision (Into Mischief) after her successful resumption in the GIII Eatontown Stakes. Messrs. Hertrich and Fielding evidently repented of serial attempts to sell her–RNA at both Keeneland September ($230,000) and Fasig October ($180,000) as a yearling, subsequently scratched from a 2-year-old sale–and she has vindicated that decision, whatever the implied influence of whiskey, in winning four of eight. Bishops Bay | Adam Coglianese She's duly rewarding their faith in her dam Funny Song (Distorted Humor), who showed little in two starts after finding her way into their hands from breeders WinStar. It was certainly alert to favor her with Into Mischief for a debut cover: even for those of us who pay little heed to nicks, the Spendthrift champ's record with Distorted Humor mares is conspicuous. (Last week we noted how Patch Adams has brought daughters of Distorted Humor up to one-fifth of Into Mischief's Grade I winners.) Back then, however, her owners needed more immediate grounds for sending Funny Song to a $175,000 cover on the back of such an inauspicious track career. Sure enough, she already had a sensational page–and, happily, it has only continued to strengthen since. Funny Song's unraced dam Music Room (Unbridled's Song) is a half-sister to a top-class pair in five-time Grade I scorer Music Note (A.P. Indy) and European Classic winner Musical Chimes (In Excess {Ire}); and their dam, in turn, was among a series of smart performers and/or producers out of champion It's in the Air (Mr Prospector). In the meantime, Music Note's son Mystic Guide (Ghostzapper) has won a G1 Dubai World Cup; Funny Song's half-sister has produced Grade I-placed Moon Over Miami (Malibu Moon); and her full sister has added not only Grade III dirt/triple turf stakes winner She Can't Sing (Bernardini) but one of the top current sophomores in GI Arkansas Derby winner Sandman (Tapit). Funny Song's next two foals were both sold as yearlings and, as fillies, their purchasers will be rubbing their hands. An $85,000 daughter of More Than Ready is still trying to break her maiden but ran second at Horseshoe Indianapolis last week; while the 2-year-old, a $525,000 purchase by Helen Alexander last September, is breezing at Saratoga. And she's by none other than Not This Time–the Albaugh family's greatest legacy, and a perfect example of endurance turning into new hope. The post Breeding Digest: Two Admirable Families Behind Dennis appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Already postponed once for rain from May 30 to June 20, weather has yet again pushed the four turf stakes on GIII Penn Mile day another week out. In a press release Tuesday morning, Penn National stated that the four stakes in question, the Penn Mile, Penn Oaks, Alphabet Soup Stakes and Lyphard Stakes will be now be held Friday, June 27. The release reads: “With significant, persistent rainfall in the local forecast for the next several days, the four turf stakes races carded for Friday, June 20th at Hollywood Casino at Penn National Race Course have been rescheduled for Friday, June 27. Those four stakes will go–as drawn–on June 27. The other 7 non-stakes races carded for this Friday, June 20th will be run as scheduled, with this Friday's first post remaining at 5 pm. Of course, the safety of our athletes–both human and equine–is everyone's top priority. Moving these four stakes to June 27 also helps ensure that our horsemen will be able to run their horses on the turf, as intended.” The track also noted that guest announced Larry Collmus will still be on site on the 27th to call those four stakes races. The post Rain Forces Another Postponement Of The Penn Mile appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article
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