JACKIE Bolger and John Corcoran raced the Orientate filly Purple Glow as a two-year-old, winning once with her and being beaten a neck by Samuel Morse in the Listed Marble Hill Stakes at the Curragh.

The following year she was covered by New Approach, Jim Bolger’s dual European champion and winner of the Dewhurst Stakes at two and the Epsom Derby at three.

He won eight of his 11 starts and was runner-up in the Irish and English 2000 Guineas to Henrythenavigator. His best son Dawn Approach was another Bolger star and went one better than his sire, winning the 2000 Guineas as well as the Dewhurst Stakes.

That December Purple Glow was sent to Newmarket for the Tattersalls December Sale from Redmondstown Stud and sold for 160,000gns to Northern Ireland breeder Max Ervine. Two years later, at the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale, Ervine saw the resulting offspring sell, through Keith Harte as agent, to John Ferguson for 180,000gns, showing a small paper profit.

MAGICAL EFFECT

The colt was named Magical Effect and while he showed some decent form in three starts for Charlie Appleby, he was sold for a mere £10,000 at the end of his second season racing. Magical Effect transferred to the yard of Ruth Carr and has made seven starts for her, winning twice, being runner-up four times and third on his only other run. Such are the vagaries of the racing game.

Purple Glow missed at stud for the next two seasons, being barren to Fastnet Rock and Poet’s Voice, and then she produced a filly by High Chaparral. Max Ervine sent her to last year’s Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale and there she was snapped up by Joe Foley for €40,000. Sent to be trained by Michael Bell for Clipper Logistics, she is named Main Desire and is undefeated now in two starts, most recently capturing the Listed Marygate Fillies’ Stakes at York. She is currently rated the best juvenile filly in training in England.

This will surely be music to the ears of her breeder who has a yearling half-brother by Rip Van Winkle at home.

Jim Bolger bought the Danzig mare Napping, the dam of Purple Glow, carrying that filly for $82,000 through Tom Gentry at the Keeneland November Sale. At the time Napping had bred a juvenile winner by Dixie Union in the USA, while Purple Glow doubled her number of winning offspring.

Napping is represented this year by a two-year-old son of Vocalised named Take A Nap, and she has a yearling filly by Teofilo also.

Napping is a full-sister to the Grade 1 Go For Wand Stakes winner Easy Now and a half-sister to a pair of Grade 1 winners by Alydar. The best known of the latter is Easy Goer, the champion two-year-old in the USA and winner of nine Grade 1 races, including the Belmont Stakes.

One of the best racehorses of all time, he denied Sunday Silence the Triple Crown when he landed the Belmont by eight lengths. Unfortunately he was denied a chance to truly establish his true credentials as a stallion due to his early death.

Easy Goer’s own-sister Cadillacing won the Grade 1 Ballerina Stakes, one of her seven victories, and she was a very successful broodmare, her stakes winners including the Grade 1 Futurity Stakes winner Strolling Along and the Grade 2 Top Flight Handicap winner Cat Cay.

Main Desire has brought a top-class family back into the limelight and one that is renowned for producing high-class two-years-old that train on. Her future progress will be watched with great interest.