IT is always something of a surprise when the five days of racing at Royal Ascot is over to realise that there are ‘only’ eight Group 1 contests held. The quality of racing throughout is so high that you feel many of the Group 2s should in fact be upgraded.

The opening day has three top-level races, Friday has two, while the others have one each. A pair of three-year-old fillies stole the show on this meeting’s penultimate day, Venetian Sun building on her juvenile success at the same meeting last year to land the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup for owners Tony Bloom and Ian McAleavy, while the Smith, Magnier, Tabor and Westerberg combination welcomed home Precise after her fourth Group 1 win, this time in the Coronation Stakes.

Venetian Sun has the imprint of Tally-Ho Stud all over her. For starters, they stand her sire Starman (Dutch Art), and his daughter was his second winner at the meeting, after Moonfall who looks certain to develop into a pattern winner. That three-year-old won the 30-runner Britannia Handicap with a degree of authority. Both winners are from Starman’s first crop, which also includes the Goffs London Sale-topper Green Sense at £700,000.

Tally-Ho Stud purchased the dam of Venetian Sun, Johara (Iffraaj), as a foal for €35,000 at Goffs, and took a loss when reselling her as a yearling for 22,000gns, a private sale being needed to complete the transaction. Johara was trained by Chris Wall and won three times, before she changed trainer and ownership and moved to France and won again at the age of five. Significantly, she twice placed in listed company there. She then made her way back to Co Westmeath.

Venetian Sun

What a broodmare Johara has turned out to be. Venetian Sun is her third foal and third winner, the others including her listed-placed two-year-old winner Sir Yoshi (Mehmas). When Venetian Sun was offered for sale as a yearling, she was one of a trio of by the sire to make an impact in Book 1 at Tattersalls.

Okay, they were not headline makers, but Tally-Ho sold three by the sire who all ended up being Starman’s best first-crop yearlings, a colt making 260,000gns and two fillies, among them the Group 1 winner Venetian Sun, selling for 240,000gns. Coincidentally, Moonfall also sold in that same Book 1, for 200,000gns. Now Venetian Sun is a dual Group 1 winner, also claiming the Prix Morny at two, and she placed in the Moyglare Stud Stakes.

Those updates came after Tally-Ho had her Kodiac (Danehill) half-sister catalogued in Book 1 last year, and she realised 625,000gns to Henry Lascelles. She is named Festive Moment, while following on is a yearling filly by Cotai Glory (Exceed And Excel) and a colt foal by Big Evs (Blue Point).

Precise

After she gained a third Group 1 in the Tattersalls Irish 1000 Guineas, adding to juvenile triumphs in the Moyglare Stud Stakes and Fillies’ Mile, the family of Precise (Starspangledbanner) was well and truly covered in this column. The European joint-champion filly last year has attained stardom, and now it is only left to see if she can achieve super-stardom. Odds are that she can and will.

Starspangledbanner (Choisir) had one winner at Royal Ascot this year, but he came agonisingly close to matching Night Of Thunder’s three Group 1 winners. Spicy Marg was beaten a head by Venetian Sun in the Commonwealth Stakes, while Gstaad was a short-head behind Bow Echo in the St James’s Palace Stakes. Precise is among 10 Group or Grade 1 winners for her sire.

Trained by Aidan O’Brien, Precise was bred by his and Annemarie’s Whisperview Trading. She is the third progeny of Way To My Heart to win, and has the great Sonic Lady (Nureyev) as her fourth dam. Annemarie gave €25,000 for the third dam of Precise, Lady Icarus (Rainbow Quest), in 2004. Four of her five winners won stakes races, two were Group 1 classic-placed, and two daughters bred Group 1 performers.

Bow highlights Boughey brilliance

WHAT a season, and Royal Ascot, George Boughey is having and did enjoy. He won with Bow Echo and Moonfall in the colours of the late Sheikh Mohammed Obaid, having purchased the latter as a yearling, and then he crowned his week with Libertango (No Nay Never) taking the scalp of the hot favourite Sun Goddess in the Group 3 Albany Stakes for fillies.

Take a moment to consider the winners of the Albany Stakes since 2021 – Sandrine, Meditate, Porta Fortuna, Fairy Godmother, Venetian Sun and now Libertango. The winner, bred by Paul Shanahan’s Lynch Bages and Timmy Hyde’s Camas Park, was sold as a yearling in Arqana for €130,000, but she proved to be a great pinhook when selling from Brendan Holland’s Grove Stud for 400,000gns at the Craven Breeze Up. She produced one of the fast breezes there.

Libertango’s sire No Nay Never (Scat Daddy) had a Royal Ascot to remember, and only Night Of Thunder did better on numbers of winners. No Nay Never sired Group 1 winner Mission Central, Group 2 winner Great Barrier Reef and Group 3 winner Libertango, while True Love was Group 1-placed. Unbeaten in two starts, Libertango is likely to be seen next in the Group 2 Duchess of Cambridge Stakes.

Loughtown Stud

Bred at Loughtown Stud by Paddy and Helena Burns, Ein Gedi (Oasis Dream) sold as a yearling for 450,000gns. She went into training with Graham Motion and ran twice at two, weakening in the closing stages of her debut, and bumped when fifth second time out. She was sent to the Keeneland January Sale at three and Tim Hyde’s Summerhill bought her for $200,000. She headed straight to Coolmore to visit No Nay Never, producing Libertango. Connections will be eagerly anticipating the sale of her yearling full-brother in the autumn.

When Causeway (Wootton Bassett) made his debut last September, he was fourth behind fellow stablemate and this year’s Derby winner Christmas Day at Gowran Park. That is the only time he has been beaten in six starts, and his climb to the top continued at Royal Ascot when he won the Group 2 King Edward VII Stakes by a neck, with the rest 10 lengths and more in arrears.

Bred by Coolmore, Causeway’s family needs no detailed account here, as he is one of a multitude of stars in it. He is a full-brother to the Group 1 Irish Oaks-placed Island Hopping (Wootton Bassett), and they are the first two foals out of a Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) full-sister to Magical and to Rhododendron, the latter responsible for Auguste Rodin (Deep Impact). Enough said.

Frankel gets a winner

THREE non-blacktype races were run on the Friday of Royal Ascot, and each supplied the only win of the week for their sires. Frankel (Galileo) hit the target when his four-year-old son Opportunity was a convincing winner of the Duke of Edinburgh Stakes for Wathnan Racing.

Bred by Meon Valley Stud and sold for 475,000gns, this was a third career win for the son of Group 1 Pretty Polly Stakes heroine Izzi Top (Pivotal). Opportunity is winner number seven for his dam, and he is a full-brother to dual Bahrain listed winner Zagato (Frankel), and half-brother to Group 3 UAE winner Prince Eiji (Dubawi). The first three dams of Opportunity are Group 1 winners.

Maclean’s Music

Wesley Ward sent three-time winner and US stakes-placed Bacio (Maclean’s Music) to Royal Ascot to win the five-furlong Palace of Holyroodhouse Stakes. This was not the only time that the minor winner Maclean’s Music (Distorted Humor) was connected to a winner at the meeting, as he is the damsire of the Listed Windsor Castle Stakes winner King Of Cloughan (St Mark’s Basilica). Bacio is winner number three for his dam Katie’s Kiss (Kantharos), a Gulfstream Park stakes winner.

Sire of the Group 1 runner-up Touleen last week, Lope De Vega (Shamardal) had his sole winner over the five days thanks to the Coverdale Stud-bred three-year-old filly Green Carrera. She won the Sandringham Stakes in some style. John Dance sold the filly as a foal for 40,000gns to Knockroe Bloodstock, and Ballylinch consigned her as a yearling at Goffs where she sold for a profitable €95,000.