John Ingles on the Musidora winner's pedigree and why Frankie Dettori could owe plenty to Frankel in his final season.
Frankie Dettori has certainly had better days at the office than he did at Newbury last month when he was unseated from Chaldean leaving the stalls in the Greenham Stakes not long after finishing a tailed-off last on Soul Sister in the Fred Darling Stakes earlier in the afternoon. But, leaving those performances well behind, those same two horses have since provided Dettori with a couple of highlights from recent weeks, with Chaldean winning the 2000 Guineas and Soul Sister putting herself in the Oaks picture with a convincing win in the Musidora Stakes (replay below).
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Both that pair are by Frankel, as is Arrest who is another leading classic contender for the jockey in his final season after his Chester Vase victory put him towards the top of the Derby betting which is headed by another son of Frankel, Military Order, after his win in the Lingfield Derby Trial.
Dettori never got to ride Frankel himself but he has enjoyed plenty of success on his sons and daughters in the closing years of his career thanks to his associations with John and Thady Gosden and/or Juddmonte. The Gosden stable has been home to some of Frankel’s best horses, notably Cracksman from his first crop, who remains his best horse on Timeform ratings. His wins under Dettori included the Coronation Cup and two Champion Stakes. 2019 St Leger winner Logician and last season’s Coronation Stakes and Prix Jacques le Marois winner Inspiral also figure among Frankel’s top ten horses, they too trained at Clarehaven and ridden by Dettori.
Dettori, Gosden and Frankel were also the winning formula behind the 2019 Oaks winner Anapurna who was her sire’s first classic winner and who went on to win a second Group 1 when successful in the Prix de Royallieu at Longchamp. Anapurna was out of Yorkshire Oaks runner-up Dash To The Top and Soul Sister too comes from a fine family of middle-distance performers which made it surprising that she started her season down in trip in the Fred Darling having stayed on well to win a maiden over a mile on heavy ground at Doncaster last autumn.
Had she not trailed home at Newbury, Soul Sister certainly wouldn’t have started the outsider of the field in the Musidora in which she gave Dettori his seventh winner of the race and John Gosden his eighth. Their 2022 winner Emily Upjohn only narrowly failed to follow up in the Oaks.
By winning the Musidora, Soul Sister kept up an unbroken record of pattern-race success by the mares on the bottom line of her pedigree which even continues back to the 1960s before the pattern system was introduced. It turns out that Soul Sister’s fifth dam, Arctic Melody, trained by Paddy Prendergast, was herself a winner of the Musidora Stakes in 1965 (her final race, so she never got to contest the Oaks). Arctic Melody in turn became dam of the 1981 Irish 1000 Guineas winner Arctique Royale as well as grandam of top-class stayer Ardross, dual winner of the Gold Cup.
A top-level success eluded Dream Peace, Truly A Dream and Truly Special (Arctique Royale’s daughter), but Soul Sister’s dam, grandam and great grandam were all smart fillies trained in France. The latter pair both won the Group 3 Prix de Royaumont, while Truly A Dream also won the E. P. Taylor Stakes in Canada, then a Grade 2 contest which had become a Grade 1 by the time her daughter Dream Peace twice finished third in it. Placed several times in Grade 1 company in North America, Dream Peace gained her biggest win in the Group 2 Prix de la Nonette at Deauville, in the process going one better than her grandam in that race.
Soul Sister’s great grandam Truly Special is also the grandam of Moonstone who contested the Musidora and then the Oaks for Ballydoyle in 2008. The Musidora was just her second start and, after finishing fourth at York, she was still a maiden when finishing runner-up to Look Here at Epsom at 25/1. Moonstone then lost her maiden tag in the Irish Oaks and later became the dam of Chester Vase winner and Derby runner-up US Army Ranger.
Soul Sister’s owner-breeder Lady Bamford has already won an Oaks with the Michael Bell-trained Sariska in 2009 who, interestingly, took the same route to Epsom, winning the Musidora Stakes after a better showing in the Fred Darling than Soul Sister, finishing fourth at Newbury. Lady Bamford had to go to 2.7m guineas to buy Dream Peace at the end of her racing career and Soul Sister is her fifth winner from as many foals.
Soul Sister is the best of them, but all the others have earned Timeform ratings in excess of 100 as well, including her full brother Herman Hesse whose two wins in Britain came at a mile and three quarters, so Soul Sister is not only sure to stay the Oaks trip but very likely to improve again for it.
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