'They do exactly what they say on the tin' - Dear My Friend maintaining a winning run for Millfields Stables

When it comes to the influence of stallion and mare in a resulting foal, Dear My Friend appears to be the ultimate winning combination.

The Charlie Johnston-trained chestnut, who has the All-Weather Championships finals among his imminent options, is three-from-three through the first part of the year including the Listed Tandridge Stakes at Lingfield.

As one of the last of Pivotal’s offspring likely to be racing, Dear My Friend has the assistance of one of the century’s most important sires in his genes, but there can be little doubt that his mother has been a significant contributory factor too.

Dusty Red was certainly nothing special as a racehorse, with the best she managed from three starts being a fourth on the Polytrack at Lingfield. Kim Bartlett, who runs Millfields Stables at Stetchworth near Newmarket, and her friend Mike Beever found the Teofilo mare for just 9,000gns at the February Sale at Tattersalls back in 2013. 

They had concentrated on the magnificent Hesmonds Stud page of which Dusty Red was a part, being a daughter of Prix de la Nonette winner Dust Dancer and a relative of top stallion Zoffany. Just as that family has continued to produce the likes of Broome, Diego Velazquez and Berkshire Rocco through the years, so has Dusty Red. 

All five of her foals to have raced have won at least once, among them being last year’s Nottinghamshire Oaks runner-up Pink Carnation, a daughter of Territories who sold for a decent 170,000gns as a broodmare prospect in December.

Dear My Friend's half-sister Pink Carnation (right) was a close second to One For Bobby in last year's Nottinghamshire Oaks Credit: Edward Whitaker

"We robbed her!" Bartlett says of Dusty Red with a laugh. "We bought her for her pedigree.

"She’d run a few times and they do always say better unraced than unplaced but it’s not true, it really isn’t, in many cases. Some of these old wives’ tales, they are what they are.

"She’s no oil painting, I can assure you, but there’s nothing wrong with her and I got my vet Ian Cameron to just give her a quick veterinary overview. She’s never bred a bad one and we haven’t always gone to necessarily the most fashionable sires either."

The first foal, a filly by Kyllachy called Ragazza, obliged in Germany, while another by Charm Spirit, Spirituoso, got three on the board for George Margarson and Lee Smyth. Red Force One, a Lethal Force gelding, has been a fine dual-purpose servant for Phil Kirby and was runner-up in a Listed hurdle at Ascot for Paul Nicholls. 

"They do exactly what they say on the tin," says Bartlett. "You could send her to the stud teaser and, believe you me, she’d get a winner.

"Ironically, the most expensive covering was Greatestshowgirl, who is by Showcasing. She never raced but is totally sound and I own her now. Her first foal, a Sergei Prokofiev colt, is a beauty and he’s lot 79 in the Craven Breeze-Up Sale, while she’s had the most cracking Stradivarius colt foal."

Dear My Friend, who was bred in partnership with Beever and Pivotal’s owner Cheveley Park Stud, was bought back as a foal and went for £40,000 to his owners Middleham Park Racing when reoffered at the Goffs UK Premier Sale.

He was Group-placed at two and won last year’s Listed Burradon Stakes, then even running in the Derby, all the time essentially justifying an instinct Bartlett had had about him all along. 

"With both him and Pink Carnation, I’ve never seen a walk like either of them have, they’re real athletic types," she says. 

Spirituoso, another member of Dusty Red's brood, won in both Britain and IrelandCredit: Patrick McCann

"He was special from the word go; people say that and you think you’ve heard that all before, but honestly he was. His nickname from the day he was born was 'Big Red'. It didn’t matter, whatever you wanted to do with him, he wanted to do it. 

"I like to trade foals at the December Sale down here and if you watch them and you see them racing each other in the field, which thoroughbreds do, you see the ones that lengthen their strides and want to beat everybody, and that was him.

"He has a great galloping stride, almost like a coiled spring as it slowly unravels and gets longer and longer – you see it when he’s racing. He’s very sound, very short-coupled and well balanced. I knew he’d be a two-year-old because he had it all there."

Dear My Friend joins Windsor Castle Stakes winner Marine Commando among the distinguished graduates from Millfields Stables, a small stud which Bartlett runs largely by herself, supported by clients from Germany and long-standing associates such as Joe Hernon of Coolmore. 

Dusty Red should produce a foal by Ballylinch Stud's Bayside Boy within the next few weeks. 

"It’s not a big commercial operation but when it goes well, it’s wonderful," she says. "A lot of bad luck comes with this game, for everybody, but touch wood, we do all right."

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