YOU might well ask why the four-year-old gelding Poet’s Society is among the featured horses this week. He hasn’t won a stakes races, ever been placed in one, and yet his name will forever be included in the history of British horse racing.

The son of Poet’s Voice (Dubawi) is the horse credited with providing Mark Johnston with his record setting 4,194th winner across the water when he gamely landed the £53,000 winners’ purse for the Clipper Logistics Handicap at York on his 57th career start!

Previously raced by Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed Al Maktoum, the three-year-old went to the Tattersalls Autumn Horses In Training Sale last October and was bought by Mark Johnston for just 18,000gns. At that stage he had raced a dozen times at two, winning three races, and lined up 19 times in his second season, winning a couple of times.

Gelded after his return to Kingsley House, he reappeared in January at Southwell, the first of 26 starts so far this year, and they have yielded six victories, with many more sure to come.

His current tally of winnings stands at £190,000 and he is a fine example of the type of sound, durable horse that Mark has built his success upon.

Bred by Darley, Poet’s Society is a son of the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Stakes winner Poet’s Voice, one of the many top-class winners sired by Dubawi (Dubai Millennium). Poet’s Voice died this year, one in which he has featured many times in this column, and his loss will be keenly felt by commercial breeders. His son Poet’s Word became his first Group 1 winner in 2018 when he won both the Prince of Wales’s Stakes and King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes. Poet’s Society is from his second crop.

One of six winners from his dam Rahiyah, Poet’s Society is the winning-most and the leading earner. To date he has not matched the achievements of his half-brothers Decathlete (Medaglia D’Oro) and Drummore (Dubawi), both of whom have been stakes-placed. The former was runner-up in the Group 3 Prix La Rochette to Karakontie, while the latter chased home Corinthia Knight in the Listed Prix Montenica at Chantilly this year. Both these runners were and are handled by Andre Fabre.

Rahiyah won second time out at two but failed to add to that subsequently. Nonetheless she was a very smart racemare and was runner-up to Finsceal Beo as a juvenile in the Group 2 Rockfel Stakes, while the following year she was third behind Darjina and Jim Bolger’s star filly in the Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Pouliches, the French 1000 Guineas. The most recent offspring of Rahiyah is a yearling filly by Dark Angel (Acclamation).

Rahiyah is a daughter of Meiosis (Danzig), one of seven winning produce of the champion three-year-old filly in Europe in 1989, Golden Opinion (from the first crop of Slew O’Gold). She earned the accolade following four wins that year, all in stakes races, and highlighted by her success in the Group 1 Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot. Her six-race career started and ended in six months and she was narrowly beaten in the Group 1 July Cup and finished third in the Group 1 French 1000 Guineas on her only other starts. She was trained by Andre Fabre for Sheikh Mohammed.

Though she bred seven winners, none of them ever reached the frame in a stakes race. Two of her daughters did produce a stakes winner. Golden Opinion was the first foal and best offspring of the Group 2 Nassau Stakes winner Optimistic Lass (Mr Prospector) and her descendants include some very smart fillies of recent years, the Group 1 Irish 1000 Guineas and Grade 1 Garden City Stakes winner Samitar (Rock Of Gibraltar), and Alice Springs (Galileo), successful in the Group 1 Falmouth Stakes, Sun Chariot Stakes and Matron Stakes.