WITH the yearling sales season in full swing, you might just have missed out on the news that No Nay Never (Scat Daddy) had his sixth Group 1 winner this week.

The Coolmore resident is having a great year, especially with his juveniles, and that crop includes a pair of winners at the top table, Blackbeard in both the Middle Park Stakes and Prix Morny, while Little Big Bear won the Group 1 Keeneland Phoenix Stakes.

Alcohol Free has been flying the flag for the older horses, winning the July Cup, her fourth Group 1 victory.

Now No Nay Never has broken new ground down under with an Australian-bred three-year-old filly, Madame Pommery, running out a clear-cut winner of the Group 1 Thousand Guineas at Caulfield. This was just her second win, her first in a stakes race, and she was previously runner-up in the Group 2 Tea Rose Stakes at Randwick.

Madame Pommery shares something significant with No Nay Never’s best son to date, Ten Sovereigns, both being out of mares by Exceed And Excel (Danehill). Madame Pommery is the third winning offspring of Cancel, twice a winner over five furlongs and a full-sister to a champion in Earthquake.

The champion two-year-old filly in Australia eight years ago, Earthquake (Exceed And Excel) gained four of her five career wins at two, notably landing the Group 1 Blue Diamond Stakes. She is the dam of two winners to date, the best being this year’s three-year-old Sumatra (Lonhro) who was runner-up in the Group 2 Thousand Guineas Prelude.

Cancel is one of eight winners from the group-placed Cataclysm (Marauding), and in addition to Earthquake she produced two more stakes winners, Palomares (Commands) and Pandemic (Sepoy).

Beneficial cross

Using Exceed And Excel in this family has proven beneficial and Cataclysm, herself one of eight winners out of Chaparra (Canny Lad), has an unraced half-sister Lindisfarne (Viscount), and the best of her five winners is Excellent Reward (Exceed And Excel). A winner at two in New Zealand, he was then sent to Hong Kong, renamed Our Folks, and his four wins there included the Listed Castletown Stakes.

Bred by Katom and sold by Coolmore as a yearling at the 2021 Magic Millions Gold Coast Sale for A$150,000, Madame Pommery has now earned A$774,600, and this improving sort will surely add to this in the future.