Juvenile Group 1 winner heading timely updates for sales-bound siblings this autumn

The yearling sales season has begun in earnest with breeders and vendors eagerly scanning results for those all-important catalogue updates that will add value to their offerings. In the first of a regular series, our team highlights some of those yearlings whose pages have timely received boosts before their relations head to the sales ring.

Tattersalls October Book 1

Lot 203

Kodiac - Johara (Iffraaj)

Bay filly

Tally-Ho Stud

For the second successive bulletin, we lead off with a yearling from the Tally-Ho Stud draft at Book 1 who is now a half-sibling to a juvenile Group 1 winner by a first season sire.

A relaxed Venetian Sun after winning the Sumbe Prix Morny

Last time it was the half-brother to Power Blue, victorious in the Phoenix Stakes. This time it is a half-sister to Venetian Sun who triumphed in Sunday's Prix Morny at Deauville, becoming the fifth winner of the race bred by the O'Callaghan family at their Westmeath farm.

Venetian Sun, by Tally-Ho Stud's Starman – who looks a shoo-in to be the latest champion first-season sire for Anne and Tony O'Callaghan – was sold out of the farm's Book 1 draft last year for 240,000gns as a half-sister to Sir Yoshi, third in the Listed Roses Stakes so their Kodiac half-sister is a valuable commodity indeed.

The family includes Group 1-winning juveniles Earthlight and Shadow Of Light, who was European champion two-year-old last year courtesy of his triumphs in the Middle Park and Dewhurst Stakes for Godolphin and Charlie Appleby.

Tattersalls October Book 2

Lot 794

Havana Grey - Fixette (Kodiac)

Bay filly

Aughamore Stud

Visitors to David Weston's Flintstone Stud outside Marlborough in Wiltshire for the trainer's open day, held as part of National Racehorse Week, will be able to see the Havana Grey half-sister to Group 2 Lowther Stakes heroine Royal Fixation.

Clerk of the Course Andrew Morris looks on from the Stewards box as Venetian Sun (right) beats Royal Fixation in the Duchess Of Cambridge Stakes Credit: Edward Whitaker

Weston bred the first Group winner by Palace Pier and sold her through Aughamore Stud for 180,000gns at Book 1 last year to Opulence Thoroughbreds. She is also the first Group winner for her dam, the Kodiac mare Fixette who was none-too-shabby herself as a juvenile.

Trained by Francis-Henri Graffard, Fixette was second in the Prix de Cabourg and Prix du Bois, both Group 3 contests, and third in the Prix la Fleche. She is also the dam of The Fixer, a son of No Nay Never who went two better than his dam in the Chantilly Listed race.

Fixette is now the dam of three winners from five runners and her yearling is sure to turn heads at Book 2 as she is also from Havana Grey's most expensively-bred crop of yearlings at £18,500.

Tattersalls October Book 1

Lot 129

Lope De Vega - Epona Plays (Australia)

Colt

Ridge Manor Stud

Renzo Forni's purchase of New Plays as a foal for €10,000 at Goffs in November 2018 has been one of unbridled success for the Italian breeder. Although the Oratorio mare never made it to the track herself, she produced for him the Group 3 Athasi Stakes winner Dolce Strega, by Zoffany, and the Group 2 winner Epona Plays, a daughter of Australia.

Composing ridden by Wayne Lordan winning The Alpha Centauri Debutante Stakes at the CurraghCredit: Caroline Norris (racingpost.com/photos)

Bumbasina, her Canford Cliffs filly, was Listed-placed on the track and sold for 75,000gns at Tattersalls July Sale in 2018 to Astute Bloodstock. She is the dam of Group 1 winner Amelia's Jewel and her Group 3-winning half-brother Bosustow.

Forni retained Dolce Strega and Epona Plays to breed from and the latter's first foal, a filly by Wootton Bassett, made €300,000 to MV Magnier at Goffs Orby last year. 

On Saturday the filly, named Composing added the Group 2 Debutante Stakes to her success in the Group 3 Silver Flash Stakes,  providing Epona Plays with the perfect start to life as a broodmare and this colt with a black-type bonanza.

Tattersalls October Book 2

Lot 1122

Lope Y Fernandez - Queenoftheclyde (Dandy Man)

Chestnut filly

Hazelwood Bloodstock

Song Of The Clyde and Rossa Ryan win at York Credit: JOHN GROSSICK

Clive Cox has a canny knack of unearthing the winner of the Goffs sales race at York, now known as Harry's Half Million, and that happy trait was in evidence last week once more when Song Of The Clyde more than repaid the £85,000 that Cox paid for him at Goffs UK's Premier Yearling sale last year.

His yearling half-sister will not be eligible for that particular race, instead she will have entry into the Tattersalls October Auction Stakes as Hazelwood Bloodstock sends her to Book 2 of the October Yearling Sale.

Adrian O'Brien's operation purchased her from breeders Whitsbury Manor Stud for 27,000gns and she is now a half-sister to a pair of juvenile winners by Sergei Prokofiev. 

Precocity is a family trait – dam Queenoftheclyde did her winning at two and she is a Dandy Man half-sister to Ardenode, successful in the Prix la Fleche and placed in the Prix du Bois.

Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale

Lot 100

Minzaal - Nijah (Pivotal)

Brown filly

McCracken Farms

When the McCrackens buy a filly or mare from the Godolphin draft, it's a purchase to note. Previous Darley castoffs with which they have triumphed include Al Andalyya from whom they have bred two Group 1 winners: Best Solution and his Kodiac full-brother El Bodegon.

Smexy (green silks) was third in the Silver Flash StakesCredit: www.carolinenorris.ie

Smexy is not at that level yet having just won her maiden for Ger Lyons and Mark Dobbin at Leopardstown on Thursday evening but the daughter of Mehmas brought 310,000gns at Book 1 last year and earned black type on her second start, when third behind Composing and Sky Dance in the Group 3 Silver Flash Stakes at the Dublin track last month.

The sale was a fantastic pinhook for Patrick Turley who bought the filly for 68,000gns from her breeders as a foal and it is interesting to note that it is the McCrackens themselves who offer her three-parts sister, from the first crop of Mehmas's Haydock Sprint Cup winner Minzaal, themselves at Fairyhouse next month.

Nijah, who cost 24,000gns as a five-year-old, is the dam of three winners from five runners and is a daughter of Pivotal and Diktat's Listed Masaka Stakes winner and 1,000 Guineas third Vista Bella.

Read more

Kent moves location as young consignor prepares for Doncaster debut 

Morny success made in Tally-Ho as Venetian Sun shines in Deauville for Starman 

Juvenile Group success on the double at the Curragh for Wootton Bassett 

Never So Brave repels all challengers to give No Nay Never a top-level 1-2 at York