Five things we learned at Goffs and from the weekend action

1 Bolger returns to the great Galileo well

When a Galileo goes the way of Jim Bolger at public auction it pays to take notice.

The master trainer has, from a dozen or so yearling purchases, managed to turn up three-time Group 1 winner Lush Lashes, a €80,000 acquisition at the 2006 Goffs Million Sale; Derby hero and sire New Approach, a snip at €430,000 from that same sale; and the 2,000 Guineas third Gan Amhras, bought for €145,000 the following year.

Bolger made his first public Galileo foal purchase at the Goffs November Sale on Wednesday, going to €160,000 for a February-foaled filly out of Replete, an unraced daughter of the champion filly and mare Banks Hill, who produced the Prix Jean Romanet scorer Romantica to Galileo. In turn, Banks Hill is one of five elite winners out of Juddmonte’s late, great blue hen Hasili.

Bolger’s new recruit, bred by Coolmore, definitely appears to be worth keeping an eye on.

The first Galileo foal bought by Jim Bolger at public auctionCredit: Peter Mooney / Goffs

2 Fascinating first foals

The Goffs November Sale always attracts the cream of the Irish crop and it has been well documented how popular Awtaad's first foals proved during the first three days of last week's sale.

The Irish 2,000 Guineas hero, who remains at €15,000 for next year, saw 21 youngsters sell for a total of €1,287,000 at an average spend of €61,286, including a May-born colt purchased by Shadwell for €170,000.

Other first-crop sires whose offspring were in demand include Ballylinch Stud's Fascinating Rock and Cheveley Park Stud's Twilight Son.

Fascinating Rock, a €7,500 option for breeders next spring who won the Champion Stakes and Tattersalls Gold Cup, saw two daughters sell for a combined €295,000, including the €185,000 paid for a half-sister to the Group-winning siblings Burnt Sugar and Brown Sugar.

Twilight Son, who breeders can avail of for £8,000 in 2019, achieved equally admirable results, with five colts and two fillies bringing in total receipts of €327,000 at an average spend of €46,714, including a €95,000 colt out of a half-sister to Jacqueline Quest.

The €110,000 Fascinating Rock filly out of Listed winner BebhinnCredit: Peter Mooney / Goffs

3 Denman relation looks the real deal

Two bright lights went out in the jumps game when leading sire Presenting succumbed to the infirmities of old age last year and his Gold Cup-winning son Denman died this summer.

Denman's dam Polly Puttens is the ancestress of eight other winners by Presenting, including Denman's brother Silverburn, winner of both the Tolworth Hurdle and Scilly Isles Novices' Chase at Sandown.

Three half-sisters to Denman - Namloc, Pretty Puttens and Southcoast Gale - have produced winners by the late Glenview Stud stalwart, two each in the case of Pretty Puttens and Southcoast Gale.

Perhaps the next star of the family will be Pretty Puttens' five-year-old Presenting son Didtheyleaveuoutto, a Listed bumper winner who fought on gamely to deny Cheltenham Festival candidate Thomas Darby in the Class 2 "Introductory" Hurdle at Ascot on Friday.

Didtheyleaveuoutto: another talent by Presenting from the family of DenmanCredit: Mark Cranham (racingpost.com/photos)

4 Frankel cross working wonders over jumps

The same Galileo-Danehill cross that gave us the sensational Frankel, as well as a plethora of other Flat stars including Highland Reel, Intello and Teofilo, continues to translate brilliantly over jumps.

Lartigue Hurdle hero Gold Seal and Saturday's impressive novice hurdle winner Inca Gold, both Flat castoffs owned by JP McManus and trained by Joseph O'Brien, are cases in point.

The combination of Galileo over Danehill mares has produced 20 winners from 31 jumps runners at a 65 per cent clip, including Irish and Punchestown Champion Hurdle winner Supasundae.

Needless to say there have been plenty of recent reminders of the type of Flat runner it can produce as well - including Coolmore Stud retiree Gustav Klimt, Belmont Gold Cup scorer Call To Mind and the ultra-promising two-year-old Japan, with last Monday's London Middle Distance Series Final winner Pipes Of Peace the latest example.

Gold Seal (far side) jumps the last en route to victory in the Lartigue Hurdle at ListowelCredit: Patrick McCann

5 In the public Eye

"The three horses in the world that matter most to the broad appeal of racing are females - Winx, Enable and Almond Eye," tweeted Racing.com editor-in-chief Shane Anderson following Almond Eye's Japan Cup win at Tokyo on Sunday.

The three-year-old Lord Kanaloa filly earned champion status in her native Japan this season having landed the fillies' Triple Crown, with her Japan Cup win - in race record time to boot - elevating her on to the worldwide stage alongside dual Arc winner Enable and four-time Cox Plate scorer Winx.

Almond Eye's pedigree is not entirely unbeknownst to British and Irish breeders, her Grade 1-placed dam Fusaichi Pandora being a granddaughter of Windfields Farm's hugely influential broodmare Sex Appeal.

Her first foal when mated to Northern Dancer was champion two-year-old Try My Best who, despite limited numbers, sired Last Tycoon and Waajib, grandsire of Acclamation and great-grandsire of Dark Angel and Equiano.

Her fifth foal by Northern Dancer was the champion two- and three-year-old El Gran Senor who, despite being subfertile like his brother, managed to sire Belmez and Rodrigo De Triano among others.

Almond Eye: the star filly on her way to victory in the Japan CupCredit: Masakazu Takahashi

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