IF there was ever a case of perseverance paying off, then the victory of Vera’s Secret, a daughter of Epaulette (Commands), in the Group 3 Al Ahira’aa Racing Mutamakina Stakes at Leopardstown is a real case in point.

Homebred by a neighbour of mine, Jim Browne at Kilnamoragh Stud in Donadea, the six-year-old was making just the eighth start of her career for trainer John Feane. She did not race until four, and there was plenty of talk in advance of her September debut over nine furlongs at Punchestown, but she was headed in the final strides of that maiden by the talented, and recent Punchestown Festival winner, Casheldale Lad.

Vera’s Secret failed to build on that promising start in two subsequent starts in 2023, but she was back with a bang last year, winning at the Curragh on her seasonal bow and later adding a valuable mares’ handicap over a mile at Leopardstown on Irish Champions Weekend. She had some four lengths to spare over Snellen that day.

With Seamie Heffernan in the saddle for the first time at Leopardstown, Vera’s Secret showed that she matured over the winter, and her trainer is ambitiously hoping that she could develop into a Group 1 mare. Whatever transpires, and the manner of her weekend success would suggest that Feane is not tilting at windmills, Vera’s Secret is also a valuable broodmare prospect.

No surprise

Last year Vera’s Secret’s dam, the placed Pure Jazz (Marju), had a colt by Profitable (Invincible Spirit), her first recorded offspring since the birth of her now group-winning daughter. Four of Pure Jazz’s first seven progeny are winners, while two more have been placed. The fact that she is capable of producing a good winner is no surprise, as her dam line rarely misses a generation when it comes to doing so.

Pure Jazz is a half-sister to four winners, three of them with blacktype. While Pure Jazz and her unraced dam Jazz Up (Cadeaux Genereaux) are both responsible for a quartet of winners apiece, this is nothing to the record of the next two dams. French stakes winner Slow Jazz (Chief’s Crown) had 10 successful runners, while the Group 2 Prix Maurice de Gheest (now a Group 1) winner Blue Note (Habitat) went one better, getting 11 winners.

This is a story going back a quarter of a century for Browne, to the Tattersalls December Mare Sale in 2000. Then, as Mercury Bloodstock, he purchased the unraced Jazz Up for 10,000gns. She was a great servant to him, and two of her daughters won pattern races, and then sold on as broodmare prospects for a lot of money. The older of the two was Jazz Princess (Bahhare), winner of the Group 3 C.L Weld Stakes at two before adding the Group 3 Athasi Stakes two years on. She later sold for 310,000gns.

Better filly

Fifteen years after Jazz Princess, her first foal, Jazz Up had an even better filly in Bounce The Blues (Excelebration), her penultimate offspring. Bounce The Blues gave Barbara Keller some great days racing, winning a Group 2 in Italy and a Group 3 in England. She sold to Nawara Stud for 450,000gns, and her first offspring is a yearling filly by Siyouni (Pivotal).

I am writing the following line with my tongue firmly in cheek. Vera’s Secret’s third dam Slow Jazz ‘only’ bred one listed winner among her 10 successful runners, and is grandam of two Group/Grade 3 winners. One of the latter is Special Wan (Belardo), and that five-year-old captured the Grade 3 Honey Fox Stakes at Gulfstream Park on March 1st. She looks like another late-developing member of this family.

Back in the late 1980s, Blue Note was a star filly for Sheikh Mohammed and trainer Criquette Head. She beat Cadeaux Genereaux to win the Group 2 Prix Maurice de Gheest, one of five victories. She was an even better broodmare, and in addition to getting the stakes-winning Slow Jazz, she produced a pair of Group 1 winners. They were the full-siblings Zieten (Danzig) and Blue Duster (Danzig). Zieten was three years older than his own-sister and trained by André Fabre as a juvenile. He was unbeaten that season, winning the Group 1 Middle Park Stakes.

Fertility problems

Zieten was retired from racing to stand at Haras du Logis. The best of his offspring included Seazun (Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes) and Torgau, the Cartier champion two-year-old filly in 1999. Zieten later suffered from fertility problems and was retired from stud duty in 2009.

Blue Duster was the champion juvenile filly in Europe in 1995 when her victories included the Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes and Group 3 Queen Mary Stakes at Royal Ascot. She did not breed a runner close to her own ability, but her daughter Blue Symphony (Darshaan) sold for 1,000,000gns and she bred the Group 3 winners Fantasia (Sadler’s Wells) and Pink Symphony (Montjeu).

The latter mare gave the family a boost when her son Highland Chief (Gleneagles) won the Grade 1 Man O’War Stakes, while two other branches of this family have also yielded recent stars. Blue Note is the third dam of the Group 1 Caulfield Cup winner Mer De Glace (Rulership), and last year’s Grade 1 Just A Game Stakes winner Chili Flag (Cityscape) who sold for $1 million at Fasig-Tipton afterwards.