WHILE it would be untrue to say that pedigree doesn’t matter at all, it is clear that Japanese buyers, for breeding purposes, put a huge emphasis on performance, and will often purchase a top-class racemare who has emerged from an otherwise pretty average female family. They also like racing soundness in a mare.

Take Dubai Majesty as an example. She is a half-sister to 19-time winner Majestic Dinner (Formal Dinner) who won seven stakes races at Beulah Park and River Downs, and was stakes-placed at Thistledown. They are not Belmont or Churchill Downs! He is one of six winning offspring of his dam.

That dam is Great Majesty (Great Above) who won four races as a four-year-old, earning just $15,500, and she was one of five winners from her dam. None of these were even stakes-placed, though her half-brother Summer Majesty (Summer Advocate) won 16 times.

All highly admirable, and generally winners got by sires who are long forgotten.

Dubai Majesty’s third dam Necaras Miss (Ambernash) bred seven winners, a pair of them victorious at stakes level, at Sportsman’s Park, Fair Grounds, Hazel Park and Bowie. Mind you, she is grandam of Totem (Al Nasr), a horse some might remember from the late 1980s. Out of the unraced Wooden (Time Tested), this David O’Brien-trained colt won the Group 3 Tara Stud Desmond Stakes, as well as listed races at the Curragh and the Phoenix Park.

Well, Dubai Majesty certainly did not know that her pedigree was somewhat average. A daughter of Essence Of Dubai (Pulpit), she was bred by Harold J Plumley and she raced for four seasons in the USA. She ran 34 times, landed her first stakes success at the age of four, and she reserved her best efforts for her final two career starts.

Swansong

Having won the Grade 3 Winning Colors Stakes in successive seasons, she stepped up a grade to take the Thoroughbred Club of America Stakes at Keeneland. Then, for her swansong, she won the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint at Churchill Downs.

Dubai Majesty then made a short trip from the racecourse to the Fasig-Tipton Sale days later and sold to Katsumi Yoshida for $1.1 million, having compiled earnings of $1.5 million.

Dubai Majesty is the best runner sired by Essence Of Dubai, a $2.3 million yearling who was a Group/Grade 2 winner in both the USA and Dubai. As his name might suggest, he raced for Sheikh Mohammed. Out of the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner Epitome (Summing), Essence Of Dubai won the Grade 2 Norfolk Stakes at two but disappointed at the Breeders’ Cup.

Sent to winter in Dubai, he won the Group 2 UAE Derby and Group 3 UAE 2000 Guineas, and then ran ninth in the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby. Essence Of Dubai did win once at three in the USA, taking the Grade 2 Super Derby. His five wins netted just over $2 million.

Brought to Japan, Dubai Majesty is now one of the star mares at Northern Farm, and understandably so. At the weekend her son Shahryar, by the great Deep Impact (Sunday Silence), won the Group 1 Tokyo Yushun-Japanese Derby on just his fourth start. A maiden winner on his only juvenile start, he won and was placed on his two second-season starts, in Group 3 company, before winning the Derby.

Second classic

While on form Shahryar was something of a surprise winner, he was giving his dam her second Japanese classic winner. Shahryar’s full-brother Al Ain (Deep Impact) won the 2017 Group 1 Satsuki Sho-2000 Guineas, one of a pair of successes he enjoyed at that level.

Shahryar, named in honour of a Persian king, is the sixth named foal from Dubai Majesty, her fifth runner and all have won. All except one have been by Deep Impact. Her only unraced produce is Jebel Ali (Deep Impact) and she is the dam of a multiple winner with her first foal and only starter.

Much as Galileo has dominated the major classics in Europe as a sire, Deep Impact has been his equal in Japanese.

In fact, Shahryar is the deceased stallion’s seventh winner of the Japanese Derby, and these have included the last four. Shahryar’s breeder was also responsible for this year’s runner-up Efforia.

Classic success on the double for Linebacker in South Africa

MICHAEL Clower reports on page 37 in this week’s paper about racing in South Africa, and a couple of their weekend winners are worth taking a look at.

The three-year-old gelding Linebacker, bred at John Koster’s Klawervlei Stud, is a son of their resident stallion Captain Of All (Captain Al). Linebacker is now a four-time winner, and three of these have been gained in classics. He won the Group 2 Guineas at Greyville over a mile, after he had been successful in the 10-furlong Group 1 Cape Derby.

At the weekend he stepped up to the longer trip again and captured the Group 1 Daily News 2000.

He can now lay claim to be the best three-year-old in South Africa and Linebacker is a great advertisement for the versatility of his sire, being a rarity because of his ability to stay 10 furlongs.

Captain Of All’s seven wins were over five and six furlongs, and all of his three Group 1 successes were over six. He was the champion sprinter and Linebacker, from his second crop, is his first winner at Group 1 level.

Linebacker is the best winner out of the stakes-placed speedster Thin Red Line, an Australian-bred daughter of Redoute’s Choice (Danehill). She is a half-sister to Samadoubt (Not A Single Doubt), winner of the Group 1 Winx Warwick Stakes at Randwick.

Act Of War

The fillies’ equivalent at the weekend, the Group 1 Woolavington 2000, went to the Summerhill Stud-bred War Of Athena, and what a filly she is.

The best female of her generation, she has won nine times and been placed on five occasions, and her weekend success was her second at the highest level.

She became the first Group 1 winner for her sire Act Of War (Dynasty), who stands at Summerhill, when she won the SA Fillies Classic, and her weekend win was her fifth at group level.

She was sold, incredibly, for R30,000 at the 2019 Ready To Run Sale, the equivalent of about €1,800. She has won 100 times that.

A son of the champion racehorse and outstanding sire Dynasty (Fort Wood), Act Of War was a Group 3 winner at two but progressed to win the Group 1 Cape Guineas at three and run second in the Cape Derby. War Of Athena is his sole stakes winner to date.

War Of Athena traces back to her fourth dam Pram (Fine Top). Born just over half a century ago, she bred the French Oaks and Grand Prix de Paris winner Dunette (Hard To Beat), who, in turn, produced the Grade 1 winner French Glory (Sadler’s Wells).