WE’RE not too sure what they were watching on TV last Monday week at Tom Jones’s Greaghwillan Stud outside Carrickmacross, but apparently it wasn’t the thrilling neck, neck and a head finish to the five-furlong race which closed out the meeting at Wolverhampton.

They should have been, because the Andrew Martin-owned and trained winner Lion King, who was recording his sixth career success on his 72nd start, was bred by Tom’s sister Breda out of Bling Ring, who was placed once at two. All the bay’s wins have been over five or six furlongs on all-weather tracks and all have been posted since moving to Martin’s yard early in 2023.

Lion King is the second of just four foals, and the only runner to date, registered with Weatherbys out of the Arch mare Bling Ring, who comes from an American family with plenty of blacktype on the page. However, of more interest to readers of this column, Bling Ring is also dam of a yearling colt by Greaghwillan’s Irish Sport Horse stallion Carrick Quidam de Revel (Quidam de Revel - Carrick Clover Diamond, by Flagmount Diamond) and the plan is to keep this fellow entire for a stallion career.

Also standing at Greaghwillan are two traditionally-bred sons of the great Carrick Diamond Lad, the eight-year-old Carrick Diamonds Diamond (ex Musical Trix, by Executive Perk), whose first crop are now four, and the six-year-old Carrick Diamond Royale (ex Hopalong Cassidy, by Strong Statement) whose first crop are two.