WHAT a way to bring up your 14th individual Group 1 winner than to sire your first Epsom Derby winner. From his fifth crop of racing age, Banstead Manor Stud’s brilliant Frankel got a coveted winner of this most iconic of races, and for good measure also sired the third-placed Hurricane Lane.

A maiden winner over an extended mile as a two-year-old at Nottingham, Adayar finished runner-up on both of his starts this year prior to tackling the notorious Epsom gradients in search of a first stakes win. Furthermore, he won the race with complete authority.

Adayar is by a sire who never raced further than the extended 10 furlongs of the Group 1 Juddmonte International, though Frankel’s sire Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) did and he won the Derby two decades ago. Galileo has gone on to sire five winners of the race, while Frankel is the second of his sons to sire the winner, New Approach having done so with Godolphin’s Masar.

Mind you, this was Frankel’s third European classic success after Anapurna in the Oaks and Logician in the St Leger. Adayar is out of a mare by Dubawi (Dubai Millennium) who never won beyond a mile, though he ran third in the 2005 Derby at Epsom.

Bred by Godolphin, Adayar is the third living produce of Anna Salai whose sole success was gained in the Group 3 Prix de la Grotte at Longchamp over a mile. After that she moved stables and ran second, beaten a head by Bethrah, in the Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas. Anna Salai made an inauspicious start to her stud career, producing a dead foal and being empty for two years.

Offspring

Her first living offspring was Anna Sophie (Sea The Stars) and she raced just once, placing fourth at Clairefontaine, and she is now among the enormous Godolphin broodmare band. She was followed by Indian Road (Invincible Spirit) and even Mark Johnston couldn’t make a decent racehorse of him, and the gelding was fourth once in six outings before selling for 4,000gns last August.

Then along comes Adayar and he has restored pride to the family with his classic success. The mating planners must have been impressed with Adayar as a youngster as they sent Anna Salai back the spring after he was born to Frankel. In between she had a daughter Bedouin Queen (Teofilo), while this year she had a filly by Exceed And Excel (Danehill).

While this family has its roots in Germany, Sheikh Mohammed has been instrumental in its development for almost four decades. Anna Salai is the best of 10 winners from Anna Palariva, a Group 3 two-year-old winner in France and a daughter of Caerleon (Nijinsky). The other nine included Epsom listed winner Iguazu Falls (Pivotal) and the four-time listed winning colt Advice (Seeking The Gold).

Group 1 level

Three daughters of Anna Palariva have bred stakes winners, two of them at Group 1 level. Adayar’s dam is one, while the unraced Angel Falls (Kingmambo) is the other. She is responsible for the champion French two-year-old National Defense (Invincible Spirit) and he is off to a good start with two winners in his limited first crop. He stands at the Irish National Stud.

Four of the first five dams in the pedigree of Adayar are stakes winners, and the odd-one-out did not race. Anna Palariva is one of half a dozen winners from the Group 3 Park Hill Stakes winner Anna Of Saxony (Ela-Mana-Mou).

One of that mare’s winning daughters, Anna Amalia (In The Wings) was bought in foal in 2005 for 150,000gns. The foal she was carrying was Ave (Danehill Dancer), a Grade 1 winner in the USA who sold to Japan for $1.4 million.

This is a family not lacking in winners. Adayar’s fourth dam was the unraced Anna Matrushka (Mill Reef) but she had 11 successful offspring, headed by Group 2 winners Pozarica (Rainbow Quest) and Annaba (In The Wings). She is also grandam of three Group 1 winners, most notably the sires Hemet (Exceed And Excel) and Epaulette (Commands).

German Oaks

One more generation removed and we find Anna Paola (Prince Ippi). Forty years ago she won the German Oaks, and her influence on the breed is not confined to the branch that has yielded Adayar.

Her winning daughter Anna Oleanda (Old Vic) was acquired for Stowell Hill Stud in 2005 for just 45,000gns. Three group winners later, two of them by Dubawi, she is also grandam of the 2018 Group 1 1000 Guineas winner Billesdon Brook (Champs Elysees).

Frankel is just completing his ninth season at stud, and what a wonderful legacy he continues to be to the late Prince Khalid Abdullah. Not only was he an outstanding runner, undefeated in 14 starts, 10 of them Group 1 races, but he has now emerged as an outstanding sire. This Derby win was a coming-of-age of sorts, being the 21st Group 1 win for Frankel.

DALHAM Hall Stud’s Dubawi is still in the early stages of his career as a broodmare sire, but his daughters have already been responsible for 33 blacktype winners, just over half of them, 18 to be precise, at group or graded stakes level.

The oldest of his stakes-performing, maternal grandsons was born in 2012, and the first of his daughters to produce a Group 1 winner was Patroness. She bred the 2018 Jebel Hatta winner Blair House, a son of Pivotal (Polar Falcon). The following year, that same race was won by a son of Frankel (Galileo), Dream Castle, and he too was out of a daughter of Dubawi in Sand Vixen.

Group 1 filly

A third Group 1 winner from a Dubawi mare appeared last year, and this was the filly Nazeef a daughter of Invincible Spirit (Green Desert). She became the first dual Group 1 winner too when she captured both the Sun Chariot Stakes and the Falmouth Stakes.

Now Adayar is the fourth Group 1 winner from a daughter of Dubawi, and he is the second sired by Frankel, a grandson of Sadler’s Wells (Northern Dancer).

Other group winners out of Dubawi mares who have Sadler’s Wells as their great-grandsire are Amorella (Group 2 winner, Group 1 placed) and her half-brother Accon (Group 3 winner and Group 1 placed), Hey Gaman (Group 3 winner and Group 1 placed), Dramatic Queen (Group 3 winner) and Tantheem (Group 3 winner).