AIRLIE Stud had a good Goffs Orby Sale, and in Book 2 they sold a Palace Pier (Kingman) son of the unraced Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) mare Flora Danica for €92,000. Johnny Hassett was seated in the bidders, below the auctioneer, and had a broad smile on his face when the hammer fell in his favour.

Hassett was beside Ramzi Alghul, and their new purchase was for Local Creator Racing in Dubai. He said: “Just loved him; love the sire - he is doing so well. His sister is in a Group 1 on Saturday. A Palace Pier that looks like that; what’s not to like? We have bought three horses at the sale to breeze. He will come down to me. All the balls are up in the air.”

He added: “It is brilliant to have a horse like him for less than a hundred grand. His type wasn’t available for the last two days at that price, and won’t be in the next few weeks. It feels right now. When you get to the breeze-ups it’s a meritocracy.”

The pedigree had received a significant boost when the colt’s half-sister Consent was runner-up in the Group 2 Park Hill Stakes at Doncaster and the Group 3 Prix Minerve at Deauville.

I joked at the time with Johnny and with Airlie’s Anthony Rogers, who had come down to wish the new owners well, that the colt would look even better value should Consent (Lope De Vega) go on to win the Group 1! Well, she did, and all sides to that transaction will hopefully benefit from the Prix de Royallieu victory. This is a family close to the hearts of Anthony and Sonia Rogers, and one that has produced a plethora of Group 1 winners in recent years.

Successful

The family was already a successful one, and back under the fourth dam, the stakes winner La Meilleure (Lord Gayle), are Group 1 winners such as Sholokhov (Sadler’s Wells), Soldier Of Fortune (Galileo), and Subjectivist (Teofilo). However, it is the branch that has been established by one of La Meilleure’s 10 winning offspring, Zavaleta (Kahyasi), that has been most prolific in recent years. A dual stakes winner, Zavaleta matched her own dam’s achievement by breeding 10 winners.

Two of these winners are deserving of highlight. Danelissima (Danehill), a Group 3 winner at Naas and the only one of those 10 winners from Zavaleta to win a stakes race, is the grandam of the 2023 Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Poulains-French 2000 Guineas winner Marhaba Ya Sanafi (Muhaarar). While not as successful as a racemare, winning twice and being Group 3-placed, Danelissima’s full-sister Daneleta (Danehill) has had the more lasting impact.

Daneleta did her best to emulate the achievements of her dam and grandam, but fell short when she had ‘only’ seven winners. However, no fewer than four Group 1 winners now descend from Daneleta, and this is a family that continues to grow in importance. Daneleta’s best offspring, the Group 1 Dewhurst Stakes Intense Focus (Giant’s Causeway) for Jim Bolger, went on to become a Group 1 sire.

Dane Street

However, it is Intense Focus’s half-sister Dane Street (Street Cry) who is leading the way in building the family’s reputation. Her three stakes winners are headed by Skitter Scatter (Scat Daddy).

She carried the Rogers family silks to victory in the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes, and this week her Too Darn Hot (Dubawi) half-brother sold to Godolphin for 1,000,000gns. Skitter Scatter’s Sea The Stars (Cape Cross) daughter sold on Thursday for 625,000gns to Ed Sackville

Skitter Scatter’s Grade 3-placed half-sister Data Dependent (More Than Ready) made a significant contribution to the pedigree last year when her daughter Aspen Grove (Justify) captured the Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes. This brings me neatly to the only produce of Daneleta who did not race, Flora Danica, the dam of last weekend’s Group 1 winner.

Airlie sold Flora Danica to Maria Niarchos’ Flaxman Stables Ireland for €420,000 as a yearling. She is now part-owner in the mare with Airlie Stud and Sonia Rogers. It has been an interesting journey so far for the partners, and the future is brighter now. Flora Danica’s first foal Versatile (Siyouni) sold well as a yearling for €235,000, but four starts in Ireland showed little. He was sold online for 15,500gns last year but has gone on to win and be placed a few times this year.

Denford Stud

Consent was next, a €260,000 yearling purchase by Oliver St Lawrence, and she is proving to be a star for owners Denford Stud and trainer Sir Mark Prescott. She has run six times, won three and been second on three occasions and she could go on to add further glory in the future.

Flora Danica’s two-year-old daughter Firgun (Dark Angel) was offered for sale last year and retained. No matter what she might do as a race filly, she is now a half-sister to a Group 1 winner. She is with Willie McCreery and will get a chance to prove herself on the track. Meanwhile, at Airlie, there is a filly foal by Sioux Nation (Scat Daddy), and Flora Danica will be covered early in 2026 having been rested this year.

Finally, there is not a lot new that one can say about the great Lope De Vega (Shamardal), other than to point out that Consent gave the Ballylinch Stud sire his 25th Group/Grade 1 winner. Hard to believe that Consent is the first of those winners out of a Galileo mare, though two were out of mares sired by sons of that great multiple Coolmore champion sire.

First Group 1 winner for Irish National Stud sire

MENTION of the latest Group 1 success for Lope De Vega (Shamardal), his 25th, brings me neatly to a first Group 1 winner for a son of his, the Irish National Stud’s Phoenix Of Spain.

This Goffs foal and Tattersalls Ireland yearling graduate, Caballo De Mar, has quickly gone from earning his first piece of blacktype a couple of weeks ago in the Group 3 German St Leger to annexing the Group 1 Prix du Cardan last Saturday in Paris. This was the tough performers’ eighth win in two seasons..

Barouche Stud’s Barbara Facchino, who bred Caballo De Mar, purchased his listed-placed grandam Daraliya (Kahyasi) for 57,000gns as a four-year-old, and that mare did well for the farm, producing eight winners. This is a branch of an Aga Khan family, and while none of Daraliya’s winners were stars, they included a German stakes winner in Circassian (Groom Dancer) and two stakes-placed winners.

Daraliya’s daughter Oberyn (Holy Roman Emperor) won twice for Barbara Facchino at three and only had two foals, both winners. Caballo De Mar, a €21,000 Goffs foal buy by Melchior Bloodstock, and €33,000 Tattersalls Ireland yearling purchase by Billy Jackson-Stops and George Scott, has amassed winnings of €380,000. Oberyn’s other foal was Robayera (Time Test), a winner in Spain as a four-year-old in 2023. As a filly, she now has some value for breeding.

Phoenix Of Spain is having a fine season. His Group 2-winning son Haatem gave Wathnan Racing a Royal Ascot winner when successful in the Listed Wolferton Stakes, adding to his 2024 win at the same meeting in the Group 3 Jersey Stakes. Haatem was placed in both the Group 1 Irish and English 2000 Guineas.

Other Group 1 performers are the weekend’s Metropolitan Handicap (in Australia) runner-up Soul Of Spain, who came within a length of giving Phoenix of Spain a spectacular Group 1 double, and fellow Group 3 winner Atsila who was third in the recent Coolmore-sponsored Matron Stakes on Irish Champions Festival weekend.