TWO of the four Group 1 winners at last Sunday’s Hong Kong International day were foaled in Ireland, and therefore can be described as Irish-breds. However, no doubt the Wertheimer brothers would argue that while Sosie was indeed foaled here, they would consider her a ‘French-bred’, in spirit at least.
That apart, there was one true Irish-bred, and this is Romantic Warrior (Acclamation) – the world’s leading money winner with more than £24 million banked, and the seven-year-old is showing no sign that age is getting to him.
He is a true racing great who has won 11 Group 1 races in four countries, and he made history at the weekend in Hong Kong when he captured the Hong Kong Cup for a record fourth time. He has only been beaten on seven occasions, finishing second five times at Group 1 level, and fourth twice, once in the Group 1 Turnbull Stakes at Flemington.
With apologies to the entire Egan family at Corduff, and the gelding’s joint-breeder Tim Rooney, there is no need to expand on his pedigree here, as most readers will be able to recite it by heart. In summary, this 300,000gns yearling purchase in Book 2 of the Tattersalls October Sale is the best of four winners from his Godolphin-bred dam Folk Melody (Street Cry), a winner at two. She was bought at Goffs for €82,000 as a five-year-old carrying her winning daughter Melodic Charm (Exceed And Excel), and Romantic Warrior, her first foal born at Corduff, is her third produce.
Yet to race for Folk Melody is her two-year-old son Le Samourai (New Bay), a 450,000gns yearling, and on the ground this spring was a filly by Havana Grey (Havana Gold). Folk Melody is one of six winners out of Grade 1 E.P. Taylor Stakes winner Folk Opera (Singspiel). She also won the Group 2 Prix Jean Romanet, the last staging before it was upgraded to Group 1 status. The latest winner out of Folk Opera is the three-year-old filly Opera Wave (Sea The Moon), successful this year.
Wertheimer winner
A three-time Group 1 winner in France, the four-year-old Sosie (Sea The Stars) is now headed only by Stradivarius and Baaeed when it comes to sons or daughters of the Gilltown stallion winning at the highest level, thanks to his weekend success in the Hong Kong Vase. He will remain in training at five.
Earlier this year he won the Group 1 Prix Ganay and Prix d’Ispahan, while at three he landed the Group 1 Grand Prix de Paris. He was third to Daryz, who also stays in training, in the Group 1 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe back in October, while at three he was placed in the French Derby.
Sosie is the best of five quality winners from the stakes-placed Sosia (Shamardal), and the second to win a pattern race this year. Also doing so was his three-year-old half-brother Uther (Camelot) who won the Group 3 Prix Noailles. All five of Sosia’s winners have blacktype, the others being the stakes winners Copie (Iffraaj) and Anasia (Intello), and the group-placed Sosino (New Approach). Sosia has a number of young stock by Sea The Stars (Cape Cross).
Placed in the Listed Prix Coronation at Saint-Cloud, Sosia is one of four stakes performers out of Sahel (Monsun), and two of the quartet are by Sea The Stars. They are the Group 3 Prix du Prince d’Orange winner Soudania and the French listed-placed Sahelian. As if that was not enough proof that Sea The Stars is potent with this family, their winning half-sister Intimhir (Muhtathir) produced the Group 3 UAE winner Star Safari, and he too is by Gilltown’s brilliant son of Cape Cross (Green Desert). The best offspring of Sahel was the Italian Group 1 winner Sortilege (Tiger Hill).
Sahel is an own-sister to no less than three Group 1 classic winners, Schiaparelli (Monsun), Samum (Monsun) and Salve Regina (Monsun). They are out of the unraced Sacarina (Old Vic). Schiaparelli’s German Derby win was the first of five Group 1 victories, and he was following in the hoofprints of the Deutsches Derby and Group 1 Grosser Preis von Baden winner Samum (Monsun) and the Group 1 German Oaks winner Salve Regina (Monsun).
This is one of the best families in Germany, and three daughters of Sacarina have gone on to produce Group 1 winners, the most notable being Sanwa (Monsun), responsible for Sea The Moon (Sea The Stars), the exceptional German Derby winner and now a successful Group 1 sire at Lanwades Stud.
Sea The Stars, the best racehorse I ever witnessed in the flesh, is rising 19, and next spring will cover at a fee of €300,000, his highest ever. He has sired 84 pattern winners and 143 stakes winners.
THE remaining two Group 1 races on the card at Sha Tin on Sunday were also won by familiar names. Voyage Bubble (Deep Field) stepped out of the shadows of his better-known compatriots Romantic Warrior and Ka Ying Rising to post a repeat victory in the Group 1 Hong Kong Mile. This means that half of his 12 wins have come in top-flight races.
Last season’s Hong Kong Triple Crown winner Voyage Bubble more than did his bit to contribute to a wonderful day of success for home-trained horses, and took his career winnings past the £12 million mark.
He joins an illustrious list of multiple past winners of the Mile, which includes three-time winner Golden Sixty. Voyage Bubble’s rider Zac Purton said: “He’s not the horse who is going to give you a ‘wow’ performance, but he’s got such a big heart that he’s always up for the fight. He’s in the shadow of the big two, but in his own right, he’s a supremely good horse.”
The seven-year-old Voyage Bubble was bred in Australia by Torryburn Stud and is one of seven foals, all winners, from the Rahy (Blushing Groom) mare Raheights. She won four times at the ages of four and five. Her first foal was the stakes-placed Brettan (Commands), and she bred another stakes winner in Diddums (Snitzel), a Randwick Group 3 winner and now herself responsible for the 2025 dual listed winner Stardom (Zoustar).
New Zealand
Ka Ying Rising (Shamexpress), the world’s best sprinter, stands on the brink of Hong Kong racing immortality after taking his winning streak to 16 with an imperious victory in the Group 1 Sprint for the second time on Sunday.
The gelding secured his sixth Group 1 victory to match Golden Sixty’s feat of posting 16 straight wins, and is now only one short of Hong Kong’s record of 17, held by Silent Witness.
Ka Ying Rising took his racing record 17 wins and two seconds from 19 starts, with prizemoney of £11.7 million. This is a true fairytale story.
Bred by Fraser Auret’s Grandmoral Lodge Racing, and voted the champion griffen in Hong Kong in 2023-24, Ka Ying Rising is the first horse that trainer Auret ever bred. He trained the gelding’s dam Missy Moo, a daughter of Per Incanto (Street Cry), and won five races with her. She had been bought for NZ$500 at the 2014 New Zealand Bloodstock National Weanling, Broodmare and Mixed Sale. After Missy Moo produced her second foal, she had to be euthanized.
Missy Moo’s dam Royal Rhythm (Rhythm) had eight other foals, all colts, and just two more winners. It is not much better under the third dam, Her Dynasty (Sir Tristram).
She showed nothing on the racecourse, and at stud had 10 foals, four of which won. Her Dynasty is a daughter of one of the greatest broodmares in New Zealand’s stud book, Taiona (Sovereign Edition). That mare bred three Group 1 winners, four stakes winners, and they were all full-siblings to Her Dynasty.