ONLY By Night has done everything right since she joined Gavin Cromwell, and she is a mare to keep on the right side of as the season progresses.

She will also have a special place in the hearts of Ronnie and Linda O’Neill in Whytemount Stud, as the five-year-old daughter of Affinisea (Sea The Stars) is the first blacktype winner for her young sire. She won the Listed Coolmore EBF Mares INH Flat Race at Navan, and has now been successful on both her starts since moving to Cromwell from Jonjo O’Neill.

Affinisea has been popular since he retired to Whytemount, and now he is living up to the expectations of his owners and the breeders who supported him. He is also sire of Affordale Fury, Noel Meade’s smart hurdler who was runner-up in a pair of Grade 1 races last year, notable the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle at Cheltenham. Affordale Fury recently justified favouritism on his chasing debut at Galway.

First crop

Only By Night and Affordale Fury are both from the first crop sired by Affinisea, bred by Jim Bolger. Sold for €850,000 as a foal to Sunderland Holding, his owners and trainer, John Oxx, had to be patient with the colt, and it said a lot for the regard in which they held him that he was kept in training at four, making a belated racing debut over a mile and a half at Roscommon in the summer of his four-year-old season. The ease with which he won had all in awe.

We did not see Affinisea again for a year, and his second start was at Killarney when he was beaten a short head over 14 furlongs, ironically going down to Hidden Cyclone, a son of the Whytemount Stud sire Stowaway.

Perhaps that was the day that Ronnie O’Neill cottoned on to the potential of Affinisea, who was not to race again. Given his foal price, and his pedigree, it was obvious that Affinisea had the looks. Affinisea is a sibling to Grade 1 sire Soldier Of Fortune (Galileo), and they are by half-brothers.

Following the success he had with Stowaway, breeders had faith in any horse Ronnie O’Neill retired to stud, and they thronged to use Affinisea. Since he went to stud in 2017, and up to this season, his books of mares have numbered 112, 122, 227, 209, 324, 382 and 268. That amounts to a huge stamp of approval, and now the racecourse results are starting to filter through.

Snapped up

Only By Night was bred by Jenny Prior-Wandesforde and sold as a three-year-old for €13,500. She didn’t make a perfect start to her racing career with Garret Murphy, falling on her first two outings in point-to-points. However, she picked herself up and at the third time of asking she beat a good field at Lingstown to win by four lengths. Sent for sale, she was snapped up for £110,000 by Stroud Coleman, Colin Russell and Jonjo O’Neill.

Three months later she was third on her only start in England, but she is now in the care of Gavin Cromwell. Now that she has blacktype, Only By Night will also be a very valuable broodmare in time. She is the first foal of the unraced Leyhill (Getaway), and she could soon be joined in the winner’s enclosure by her full-brother Crawter (Affinisea). He was runner-up in one of his two starts this year in point-to-points in England.

Leyhill is out of a half-sister to Somersby (Second Empire). He came into his own when sent chasing, though he won a bumper and a hurdle race. He won the Grade 1 Clarence House Chase at Ascot and on three occasions was runner-up at Cheltenham, twice in the Grade 1 Queen Mother Champion Chase and also in the Grade 1 Arkle.

Shantou’s influence on Brechin’s family

SHANTOU sired the first two home in the Listed Cheltenham National Hunt Flat Race, but the winner Brechin Castle always had the measure of his 11 opponents, and he has many options for the future. Likely to be kept to bumpers for now, there is talk of him coming to Leopardstown for the Dublin Racing Festival in February.

Sold as a foal by his breeder Mary Brennan at the Goffs December Sale for €52,000, Brechin Castle was resold for £165,000 to Brookhouse Racing on the back of a win in his only start between the flags. He remains unbeaten after two bumper runs, and he possesses the pedigree of a star National Hunt performer.

The fourth foal out of the bumper and hurdle winner Glorious Twelfth (Old Vic), Brechin Castle is a half-brother to Wynn House (Presenting), placed in a listed bumper and subsequently adding four hurdle wins to his single win on the flat. Now that Glorious Twelfth has clicked so well with Shantou (Alleged), there is much to look forward to with his four-year-old full-brother Minella Sixo (Shantou), while Monbeg Stables purchase their three-year-old full-brother at this year’s Goffs Arkle Sale for €50,000.

Wonderful Bilboa

Glorious Twelfth is a daughter of the wonderful Bilboa (Phantom Breeze). The Grade 2 winning hurdler in England and Grade 1 Champion Hurdle placed Bilboa carried Joerg Vasicek’s colours during her racing days. He and his wife Diana bought and developed Kenilworth House Stud in Tipperary.

Bilboa compiled a very impressive record as a broodmare, with six racecourse winners and three more who won point-to-points. It was in fact the penultimate of her dozen offspring who gave up her only blacktype winner, Enjoy It (Jeremy) winning a listed three-year-old hurdle race at Auteuil. Six-time winner The West’s Awake (Yeats) and dual winner Three Wise Men (Presenting) both earned blacktype with their placed efforts.

Brechin Castle’s win was appropriately at Cheltenham, as this is where Imperious won at this year’s Festival meeting. She is out of a point-to-point winner who is a half-sister to Glorious Twelfth, and Imperious is also by Shantou. This is a cross that works well within the family.

Impressive

This is a hugely impressive female line, and one that has had influence in a number of ways in National Hunt racing and breeding. Bilboa was not far off winning a Grade 1, while her half-sister Makounji (Tip Moss) was a listed winner over hurdles in France, a Grade 2 winner over fences in England, and she ran third in the Grade 1 Mumm Melling Chase at Aintree. Makounji is also the dam of a listed chase winner.

Bilboa and Makounji are among five winners from Maisonnaise (Labus), and she was a half-sister to Mansonnien (Tip Moss). While he was a smart racehorse, placed in the Group 1 Prix Ganay and winner at Group 3 level, he today often features in jump pedigrees as he was a successful sire in that sphere.

Just think of performers such as Mansony and J’y Vole, while sons of Mansonnien at stud include Diamond Boy.