READERS of this column do not need reminding about how hard it is to win an English or Irish Derby. To win both in a year is even more difficult, though not impossible.

Twenty horses have come on from Epsom to add the Irish crown, and Lambourn is the latest to do so.

The first horse to win both was the Fred McCabe-trained Orby in 1907. He is buried, alongside his dam, outside the front door of the British Ambassador’s residence at Glencairn, not far from Leopardstown. Then there was a big gap until Santa Claus repeated the feat in 1964 for Mick Rogers. They were followed by Triple Crown winner Nijinsky in 1970, Grundy five years later, and The Minstrel in 1977.

Shirley Heights was the first of three in the following four years to do the double in 1978, before Troy (1979) and the legendary Shergar (1981) added themselves to the record books soon after. The Aga Khan loved to win both races, and all of his Epsom winners completed the double.

Shahrastani (1986), Kahyasi (1988), Generous (1991) and Commander In Chief (1993) all achieved the Epsom-Curragh Derby double, before the great Sinndar won both in 2000, and went on to become the only horse to win the Arc later in the season.

Aidan O’Brien is now responsible for six of the last seven dual winners, with Galileo taking control in 2001, and High Chaparral joining him a year later. Aidan’s son Joseph guided both Camelot (2012) and Australia (2014) to victory in both classics. Harzand was a fifth dual winner for the late Aga Khan IV, doing the double two years after Australia, and two years ago Auguste Rodin continued Ballydoyle’s dominance. Lambourn is the latest to join this elite list.

What an achievement it is for Aidan O’Brien to achieve this double in each of the last three decades, and with horses who went on to sire a horse to be among this elite 20. Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) got Australia, one of the best-bred horses to win an Irish Derby, being a son also of Ouija Board (Cape Cross), a European champion whose victories at the highest level comprised two Breeders’ Cup wins, the Oaks and Irish Oaks, the Prince of Wales’s Stakes, a Hong Kong Vase and the Nassau Stakes.

Best runners

Now Australia has taken this to a third decade and another generation, and Lambourn is one of the best runners sired by the Coolmore stallion who was available this season at €10,000. I know many breeders who used him this year, and they have every reason to be chuffed. In addition to Lambourn, he is also the sire of Joe Murphy’s Royal Ascot Group 1 winner Cercene.

Australia’s crops do better with age, and Lambourn is a member of his seventh crop. He has 48 stakes winners, with just over half of them (25) gaining their most important success in either a group or graded stakes. His other Group/Grade 1 winners are Broome, Mare Australis, Order Of Australia, Ocean Road, and Galileo Chrome.

Lambourn is the second foal and first winner for Gossamer Wings (Scat Daddy), who cost $500,000 as a yearling and was beaten a whisker in the Group 2 Queen Mary Stakes at Royal Ascot. She has had two colts by Frankel; the two-year-old is named Action and is unraced.

Gossamer Wings has 10 winning siblings, and three of them were successful at stakes level. Lambourn has taken his female family to another level.

Outstanding weekend for Coolmore starts with a Whirl

THREE European Group 1 races at the weekend were won by horses sired by Coolmore stallions.

That sequence began on Saturday when the Group 1 Oaks runner-up Whirl showed class and guts to beat Kalpana in the Group 1 Paddy Power Pretty Polly Stakes. This was a first Group 1 flat sponsorship by the betting company, and what a race they got for their money.

There is simply no stopping Wootton Bassett (Iffraaj), and Whirl is his fifteenth Group 1 winner. His first six crops had four Group 1 winners, and the most was one in any crop. His final two French-conceived crops yielded two winners each, as did his first crop from his Coolmore coverings in 2020.

Since then the numbers, in every sense, have exploded. He has five Group 1 winners among his three-year-olds, four of which won at this level in 2024.

Now there are three classic winners in 2025, both Camille Pissarro and Henri Matisse going on to double their Group 1 haul this year, capturing the Group 1 Prix du Jockey Club-French Derby and Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Poulains-French 2000 Guineas respectively. Whirl is his third, and yet another example of how well Wootton Bassett works with Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) line mares.

Outstanding runners

Whirl is the first foal out of Salsa (Galileo), a full-sister to three outstanding runners, but she did not inherit their talent for racing. She won a maiden on the penultimate start of her 10-race career, but she seemed to reserve her best for the Curragh, and on both occasions that she raced there she was runner-up. Salsa has a two-year-old full-brother, Kepler (Wootton Bassett), to Whirl, and a yearling own-sister.

Salsa’s dam is the ultra-smart Beauty Is Truth (Pivotal), and all of her three victories came in blacktype races in France, her best win being in the Group 2 Prix du Gros-Chene. Four of her six winners were victorious in group races, five were sired by Galileo, and four of her daughters have bred stakes winners. This is a branch of an already hugely successful family that one feels will grow into greatness.

In order of their birth, Beauty Is Truth’s three Group 1 winners, all by Galileo, are The United States, Hydrangea and Hermosa. The United States showed his best form when sent to race in Australia, and there he won and placed in the Group 1 Ranvet Rawson Stakes. He is now at stud in South Africa where he is a multiple stakes sire.

Classic-placed

Hydrangea was knocking on the door of a Group 1 win for ages, being runner-up at two in both the Moyglare Stud Stakes and Fillies’ Mile, while at three she was classic-placed. When she won a Group 1, the Matron Stakes, there was nothing for it but to add a second. Now she is off to a great start at stud, with two stakes winners by Dubawi (Dubai Millennium). One of these, her daughter Wingspan, was runner-up in the Group 1 British Champions Fillies/Mare Stakes, a race won by her dam.

Hermosa matched Hydrangea’s feat of two Group 1 wins, but hers came in the English and Irish 1000 Guineas. She raced and placed in many of the Group 1 races contested also by her older sister, and she has gone one better as a broodmare.

Though only dam of a single stakes winner to date, that winner for the Hermosa is Trinity College (Dubawi) and he won the Group 3 Hampton Court Stakes at Royal Ascot last month.