SHEIKH Ahmed Al Maktoum has enjoyed plenty of Group 1 victories in his distinctive colours, and the first to carrying them with distinction was Mtoto.

At the Curragh he won an Irish Oaks with Possessive Dancer and Pretty Polly Stakes with Nezwaah, while Tobougg, Ameerat, Nahrain, Addeybb and the 2024 1000 Guineas winner Elmalka have been others among his winners at racing’s top table. This year Almaqam (Lope De Vega), trained by Ed Walker, joined the stellar list when he won the Tattersalls Gold Cup, and will attempt to add to it in this afternoon’s Irish Champion Stakes.

In the course of gaining that first Group 1 win, Almaqam had a sibling, the Roger Varian-trained Saddadd (Pinatubo), back in third. He too sported the colours of Sheikh Ahmed, and went into the race off a seasonal debut win in the Group 3 Gordon Richards Stakes. The four-year-old Saddadd bounced back at the weekend from a slightly disappointing run in the Eclipse Stakes, and a two-month break, to record his maiden Group 1 win in Germany in the Grosser Preis von Baden.

When Almaqam won in May, he gave his Ballylinch sire Lope De Vega (Shamardal) a 27th Group 1 winner, while Saddadd has now credited Dalham Hall’s Pinatubo, also a son of Shamardal (Giant’s Causeway) with his first. It is a feature of runners out of the Cape Cross (Green Desert) stakes winner Talmada that they improve with age. That said, Talmada’s half-brother Saamidd (Street Cry) was a two and a half-length winner of the seven-furlong Group 3 Champagne Stakes at two. Prior to getting two first-time Group 1 winners in the same season, Talmada produced the stakes-placed, four-time winner Saleymn (Dubawi), and this year has seen the appearance of a fourth winner, Eklleel (Wootton Bassett) in France, trained by trainer of the moment, Francis Graffard. She is followed by a two-year-old filly, Tarrjoo (Dubawi), and a yearling full-sister to Saddadd.

Talmada’s talent

Roger Varian trained Saddadd’s dam Talmada. She raced 13 times, and on her penultimate start she gained just her second win, but crucially in a listed race, the 10-furlong John Muskar Stakes at Yarmouth, beating the subsequent dual Group 1 winner Speed Boarding. Talmada was talented, and finished in front of Ribbons when runner-up in a Group 2 at York, and was second to Covert Love in a listed race at Newcastle. Next time out that winner landed the Group 1 Irish Oaks at the Curragh and won another at Longchamp on Arc weekend.

For her final start, and just as he did with Saddadd, Varian looked abroad for an opportunity to win a Group or Grade 1, and sent Talmada to Canada for the E.P. Taylor Stakes. David Wachman had the same idea for his Group 2 Ribblesdale Stakes winner Curvy, and honours went to Ireland on this occasion, with Talmada an honourable second. However, Talmada has been a far better broodmare.

The female side of this family is one developed by the late Gerald Leigh at Eydon Hall Stud. He sold the stakes-placed Zibilene (Rainbow Quest) carrying her first foal for 1,500,000gns to Barouche Stud in 2001.

She was by some way the best price at the December Sale that year, and this was after a half-sister sold at the same venue for 1,700,000gns.

They were the highest and third-highest prices ever paid for a broodmare in Europe at the time.

Value enhanced

Zibilene’s value was enhanced in the year of her sale by a Group 1 Fillies’ Mile win for her half-sister Gossamer (Sadler’s Wells), and she would go on the following year to add the Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas. Gossamer was born nine years after her full-brother Barathea (Sadler’s Wells), winner of the Group 1 Irish 2000 Guineas and later of the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile. He became a successful Rathbarry Stud sire. Zibilene is the third dam of Saddadd.

Pinatubo suffered a sharp drop in his fee this year, from an opening £35,000 to half that figure Lack of a top-notch winner in his early crops led to his fall in fee, but he had an enviable ratio of blacktype horses. This year he is the sire of 17 stakes performers, and the others include Komorebi who was beaten a length into second by Rayif in the Group 1 French 2000 Guineas. Pinatubo is also sire of the 2026 stakes winners Pivotal Attack, Dickensian, Pina Sonata and Secret Of Life.

Two stalwarts worth talking about

VISUALLY at least, there was no better winner last weekend than Almeraq (Dark Angel) at Haydock Park. He ran away with the six-furlong Group 1 Sprint Cup, winning by more than four lengths, and guaranteed himself a place at stud. Will that be next year or 2028?

Shadwell’s last winner of the race was Minzaal, now a prominent first-season sire with 14 winners, only equalled or bettered by Persian Force, Blackbeard and Bayside Boy. Minzaal was gaining his first Group 1 win at Haydock, but Almeraq has already been a winner at racing’s top table, beating an international field in the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot. His versatility is shown by the fact that he landed his top-flight victories on good to firm and on heavy.

Dark Angel (Acclamation) has sired Group 1 winners in all but three of his first 14 crops. His total comes to 18. Almeraq joins Harry Angel as a second Haydock Sprint Cup winner by the Yeomanstown Stud veteran. When Dark Angel retired to stud he was part of a fashion for some years of juveniles heading straight to the stallion barn. It is hard now to believe that he stood at €7,000.

Almeraq has won five of his nine starts, and only twice been out of the money. Once was when he fell at York last year. He is the first foal of Manaajim (Muhaarar), a 925,000gns yearling thanks to her year-older half-sister Fairyland (Kodiac) winning the Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes.

She would go on the next season to capture the Group 1 Derrinstown Flying Five at the Curragh. Manaajim was with William Haggas but never ran.

Her trainer has done well with her son. Haggas also trains Almeraq’s three-year-old sibling Albaydaa (Pinatubo), and she has won twice. There is a juvenile half-brother, El Asjadi (Night Of Thunder), a yearling filly by Blue Point (Shamardal), and a filly foal by Dubawi (Dubai Millennium).

The grandam of Manaajim is the Group 2 Flying Childers Stakes winner Land Of Dreams (Cadeaux Genereux), and her outstanding runner was the champion and Group 1 sire Dream Ahead (Diktat).

Friendly Soul

The other mention here is for George Strawbridge’s homebred Friendly Soul (Kingman). What a joy to see the five-year-old back in the winner’s enclosure after the Group 1 Prix Vermeille, two years after she was victorious in the Group 1 Prix de l’Opera. Strawbridge has to be admired for returning Friendly Soul to the racecourse after a near 600-day break, and her return was almost a disaster. She is as good as ever based on her weekend win.

Friendly Soul is one of four Group 1 winners for her dam In Clover (Inchinor) who died last year at the age of 23. She has two-full-siblings to the dual Group 1 winner in the wings, a two-year-old colt Kingin and a yearling filly. Could that Group 1 number grow even more? The four Group 1 winners are among seven stakes winners from In Clove, while one of her daughters bred the Group 1 Prix de la Foret winning filly Kelina (Frankel).