The Kings Falcon, who had an fairly ordinary debut on very heavy ground at Newbury, is entered Saturday at Newmarket where hopefully (!) better going gives him a fairer test. Only 4 horses ran in September with a 3rd in a Nursery to show for it. Not a great performance. Still only three 2yos sighted. From what I can see 4 Royal 3yos are entered in the Horses in Training Sale. They are: Crown Estate; won twice as a 3yo High Order; won once as a 3yo The Kings General placed once as a 3yo Candle Wax ran 4 times All relative failures, 3 of them by Dubawi and one by Frankel (what a waste). All out of mares/families brought into the stud by Warren. Unaccounted for (and so possibly still in training?): Serried Ranks, Reaching High, Gilded Water. You could add to these the 4yo Slipofthepen.
At last the King's pulse must have quickened seeing Treasure's performance at Newmarket. She hadn't run since Royal Ascot when near last in a fillies handicap. Before that she'd beaten one home in the Oaks. Yesterday she was the outsider in the field and was just about last at halfway. Going into the dip she started making up ground but it wasn't until the last half furlong that she was in the chasing group. She then surged into 2nd being beaten by a rapidly reducing neck (I thought nearer a 1/4 length or at least a long neck). Hornby was keen to settle her early in the race and did not give her a hard race. My guess is that they will now look for a 10f Listed race to get her some black type. She won an end of season maiden last year on heavy going. Yesterday's race was her first this season where soft was in the going description. If his pulse quickened there he must have been near an ICU case when later his High Order couldn't beat another horse in a Southwell handicap. By Frankel out of a Dubawi mare you'd hope for better, surely?
Nearly 10 weeks since a Royal winner (to be fair hardly any have run). Yesterday The Kings Falcon ran his second race and was backed down to joint favourite at Kempton. He was outpointed by a (another) Beckett 2yo, who looked useful. The Royal colt did at least beat the rest by more than 3 lengths. So some promise but he'll never be world beater. Earlier in the day his little sister, by Camelot, went through the ring at Newmarket Yearling Sales (Book 2) and sold for a measly 7,500gns. Camelot's fee was 75,000€ the year this filly was conceived, so not a good result. Earlier in the day a Sea the Moon filly out of Approximate (a daughter of Estimate) sold for 20,000gns. That leaves one more to sell as the Good Hope filly (by Ulysses) was withdrawn. One must wonder how this is all going down with the King. No foals appear to be for sale at the late November Foal Sale. The GBB site has adjusted the registration of Desert Flyer's Dubawi filly and she is now showing as registered.
I remember once reading that the quickest route to being a millionaire was to have £10m and buy horses
I don't believe it! Beckett enters one of his 2yos at Doncaster next week. Tempting Fate, a filly by Wootton Bassett out of Magnetic Charm gets a chance to show her ability in a maiden. Hopefully Beckett's current run with his 2yos will continue with this one.
I was right not to believe it, she was withdrawn today. Tomorrow sees the publication of the Tattersalls Breeding Stock Sale. Fascinating to see how many mares and fillies the Royal Stud sends there. If I was them I'd sell Falsetto, Sweet Idea, Kings Ginger, Make Fast, Works of Art or Handcuffed, Royal Command and Star Value. Other possibles are Anglepoise, Clear Thinking, Desert Flyer, Value Added, Birdie Time and De la Treble. Shocks would be Hard to Resist, Treasure or Rainbow's Edge. This year has been a disaster and the Stud must get some precocity, toughness and soundness into their stock. The fact that horses are not getting to the races tells a sorry story.
The Royal Stud has 11 entries at the Tattersalls December Breeding Sale. Falsetto, Make Fast, Kings Ginger, Royal Command and Works of Art go as I expected. Of my probables, Anglepoise goes while the surprise for me is that Treasure is included in the list. Of the others going I should have had Approximate while Late Claim (came from nowhere) and Al Nayeba (ditto) were unsurprising shocks The 11th member is Shepherd's Delight. So to sum up in terms of families:- Make Fast and Works of Art [the former is the dam of the latter and started her stud career with the useful Tactical] their sale leaves Handcuffed and a filly foal by Cracksman left in Royal ownership of this family. Falsetto [non-winning 3yo, last foal of Set to Music] this family has now gone. Royal Command [3yo, unraced foal of Enticement] Enticement with her daughter Diploma and granddaughter Portfoilio remain as does a Sea the Stars yearling daughter of Diploma. Approximate [ non-winning 7yo daughter of Estimate, yearling daughter recently sold] no daughters, so Estimate and her daughter Market Value remain of this family. Kings Ginger [non-winning 3yo daughter of Sweet Idea] Sweet Idea and her daughter Companionship remain of this family. Anglepoise [non-winning daughter of retired mare Hypoteneuse ] another branch of the Amicable family is lost, leaving only 2 branches (there were formerly 10). Late Claim [recently named unraced 3yo daughter of Star Value] Star Value plus a filly foal by Land Force remain and possibly Value Added (fair filly who surprisingly went over hurdles but no longer in training). Shepherds Delight [unraced 2yo daughter of Fiery Sunset] last of family, likely interest to Australians as 4yo half-brother won G1 there. Al Nayeba [ recently purchased mare who leaves no filly in the stud] Treasure [winning 3yo filly] candidate for withdrawal from sale though has 2yo half-sister, De La Treble, still owned though not in training. If there are no private sales this would suggest that Rainbows Edge and Hard to Resist join the Royal Stud Roster.
Only 3 sell as Candle Wax was withdrawn. Crown estate made 110,000gns, The Kings General 45,000gns and High Order 32,000gns. Still only three 2yos entered. Haggas one 2yo has run: one place by The King's Falcon c by Dubawi - Desert Flyer Purple Rainbow f by Night of Thunder - Daphne Golden Handshake c by Zarak - Star Value Aeolian f by Fastnet Rock - Desert Breeze Balding one 2yo has run: one win by Handcuffed Bouquet de Paris c by Le Havre - Light Music Gosden no 2yo runners Warrant Holder c by Frankel - Diploma Beckett one 2yo has run: Royal Equerry has been placed twice Dust Cover c by Showcasing - Dusty Dream Tempting Fate f by Wootton Bassett - Magnetic Charm Not placed with trainer Value for Money c by Lope de Vega - Estimate Gilded Flow f by Sea the Moon - Golden Stream Gift of the Queen c by Land Force - Medley Birdie Time f by Sea the Moon - Good Hope De laTreble f Magna Graecia - Shimmering Light every chance that some of these will never run. All a bit underwhelming. Always a worry when horses don't run, that's what they are bred for. It's not the King's fault that they are not.
The Royal Stud offloaded a number of mares and fillies at Tattersalls' breeding stock sale this week. The best prices were obtained for Make Fast (95,000gns) and her daughter Works of Art (100,000gns). So this leaves the 2yo winner Handcuffed and a filly foal by Cracksman from this family. Next best was Falsetto, who although useless on the track realised 55,000gns. As she was by Galileo you have to hope the Royal Stud did not pay the full price for this covering. 50,000gns was received for Al Nayeba who arrived in the stud 3 years ago and leaves a yearling colt by Wooded. 42,000gns was paid for the unraced 3yo Royal Command (by Kingman out of Enticement). This filly's family is well represented in the stud by her dam, a half-sister Diploma and her daughter Portfolio. Estimate's daughter Approximate went for 28,000gns but Estimate and her daughter Market Value are still in the stud. There were two cheapies in Anglepoise (1,000gns) and Late Claim (6,500gns). Treasure and King's Ginger were withdrawn. Finally an unraced 2yo filly, Shepherd's Delight was sold for 14,000gns. This is the last female from the imported mare Fiery Sunset, who was sold for 170,000gns last year. So this family has gone from the stud and I have to question why? Fiery Sunset was a Juddmonte import and although not a great success on the track did win a race. At stud her first two produce won ( the first has gone on to produce a winner at stud and the second has subsequently won 3 races in the USA including a Group 3) and then her 3rd living produce to race was Circle of Life. He won only one race for the Queen as a 2yo but was felt worthy of a placed run in the Lingfield Oaks Trial. At this point Fiery Sunset was sold, as was Circle of Life who then went on to win two Group 2 races in Australia. Now his year younger half-brother Gilded Water, who won a race for Haggas this Summer, has been transferred (still owned by HRH) to Australia and has won. What was Fiery Sunset doing wrong? There are a few more unrewarding mares in the Royal Stud than her and if they knew her son Gilded Water had some ability then why was she sold? To me this smacks of bad judgement. So this brings to an end a poor year for the King and the Royal Stud. 8 wins, though 9 if you include Gilded Water's Australian win. I'll have more to say on this.
I was thinking about the poor year and who is to blame. Initially I was thinking it was mostly down to breeding decisions taken over the last few years producing "sub-optimal talent" but I guess a good deal of the blame must also lie with the trainers and racing manager for not managing to get better results with the stock they have. Aiming the horses too high maybe (5 runners at Royal Ascot this year)? Poor placement? Not sure really, but just 8 wins is a very poor return - not sure how many horses he has in training in total?
I think I should start with the view that the Royal Stud has been in decline since the late '50s. It had a good '70s with two dual classic winners (Highclere and Dunfermline) but nothing to compare with the general excellence of the '50s, even if those classic winners were real highlights. I think The Royal Stud like other major owner breeders never recovered from the losses of '39 to '45 when many sires were sold off to America and elsewhere when things looked bleak. Also bad decisions were made by Irish breeders in selling off their sires. Today we are not used to seeing sires go West but even in my lifetime Ribot, Sea Bird and Vaguely Noble were effectively lost to European and British breeders. It was only through the efforts (or strategy) of Sangster and Coolmore that the tide turned and this has been built upon by the financial investment and strength of the Arab owners. But too late for the British owner breeders and I've seen the Astors, the Joels, Holliday, Ballymacoll, the Freedmans and Lord Howard de Walden all wither and mostly disappear. Continual use of relatively ordinary sires weakened their families and it takes a more than a couple of generations to get that strength back. For the Royal Stud the fatal blow was the selling of Height of Fashion and a few of of her sisters. So there's that overhanging any comments on what I feel went wrong with this year. I think you are correct that horses have been aimed too high. I think there was little point in running 3 of the 4 horses that went to Royal Ascot but this has been a 'thing' for the last 4 seasons. Treasure should never have run on the the firmish ground (in the Oaks and at Royal Ascot) as she only acted on soft or worse. In fact I believe her career was blighted by running her on that ground for her first 3 starts this year. RA last year did have a genuine competitor in Desert Hero in that he was a good 2yo and was having his 5th start in the race he won. But I'd go back to 2021 and say Reach for the Moon had his career blighted by being tried too highly too early. He'd finished 2nd in a fairly ordinary Yarmouth maiden then found himself taking on a well-tuned O'Brien 2yo in Point Lonsdale. He ran a very brave but hard race and I believe he'd have been better off picking up a maiden at somewhere like Newbury or Newmarket rather than slugging it out in the Chesham on soft to heavy ground. I'm a believer in getting horses out to run as 2yos. AOB does it, Dick Hern used to do it and Noel Murless ran his Derby, colt on his debut, in the Coventry: but don't overtry them. If RftM had won turning handsprings on his debut then fair enough, but he didn't. I can't believe that there is anyone else but Warren to blame for this. He should stop it and only run horses in races in which they can justifiably compete. Which brings me to horses running at all. As I pointed out in an earlier post only 4 Royal 2yos made it to the racetrack this year. So only 2/3 of the Royal 2yos ran and I don't think that is enough. I believe if the ratio of 2yo runners to non-runners was turned round that you'd feel less uneasy(i.e. that 8 had run). I understand backward horses, some of my favourites were backward but such a high proportion not running as 2yos should be a concern. At the heart of a good horse is speed and I feel The Royal Stud has had stamina and not speed at the forefront of its breeding policies. I certainly don't expect them to turn their backs on stamina but there has to an injection of speed from time to time. Take Estimate, a racefilly whose best distance was 20f. Her partners were Dubawi, Dubawi, Dubawi, Frankel, Siyouni, Sea the Stars, Lope de Vega and Sea the Stars. All top class sires but only Siyouni could be anywhere identified as a source of real speed. The result of this mating was a filly who won over 9.5f while the other matings have produced horses who couldn't win over less than 14f. Why not drop in a sprinter or a 7f/8f specialist now and again? Expecting to get a precocious (and by that I mean a horse who runs and hopefully wins as a 2yo) horse by mating Estimate to a series of sires with stamina indexes of 9f+ looks daft to me. Why not use Blue Point, Dark Angel, Kodiac, Mehmas, Muharrar etc. over the last 10 years. The Royal Stud have used the first two (once each) but sent them to their faster fillies. It's all been so predictable. I would make sure 20-25% of my matings were to sires who were precocious and specialised at distances of 5-8f I'd also mix it up. Why send Estimate to Dubawi 3 years on the trot? I think Warren and his father in law (Porchester/Carnarvon) have been the architects of the demise of the Royal Stud. In 2021 the Queen had 35 winners and certain journalists declared victory for Warren's changes over the last 20 years. Sorry but the data did not support that claim and the 3 seasons since have underlined how it was families that have been around before that were the reliable mares. Some of Warren's imports have been dire (eg Sweet Idea, Shimmering Light, Star Value). Yes there's been the success of Desert Hero (mare Desert Breeze) and Call to Mind (mare Memory) but that's about it. Decisions have seemed strange such as the sale of Fiery Sunset. It's not impressive. Maybe after writing this criticism they'll have a fantastic 2025. I would welcome it.
Agree fully on the lack of imagination on breeding - unless they are looking to produce staying hurdlers.
Surprising entry (at last) on Friday in a Wolverhampton maiden for the 2yo Purple Rainbow. She's a Night of Thunder filly out of the Queen's listed winner Daphne. This mare's first foal was the useful Perfect Alibi (by Le Havre) who won 3 times for Haggas including a Listed event. Though Haggas rarely wastes his powder, and is perfectly capable of readying a horse to win first time out, it's likely this one is a long term prospect and will need more than the 7f. Having said that. the Bustino EW shilling will be on. Fallon is already booked for the mount. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all the impoverished readers of this thread.
A win before the New Year would have been nice but it wasn't to be. Purple Rainbow ran a purposeful race but was outpaced by the more experienced favourite who beat her a length. She showed she had some ability and just ran about in the final 150yds, through greenness.. She should come on for that run. Goes to the top of the Royal most promising 2yo list. Needs further and should win her maiden.
@Bustino74 I've unstuck this thread as we are now in 2025. Let me know how you want to proceed for 2025 (new thread or rename / extend this one). Thanks
