John Ingles looks at how this season's first-season sires are shaping up.
The fact that Starman had no two-year-old career of his own hasn’t mattered in the slightest when it comes to his success with his youngsters in the early months of the season. Starman didn’t see a racecourse until the summer of his three-year-old season, and he was four when recording a career-best effort in the July Cup.
Much more important in his stallion career has been the size of his first crop, and with forty individual runners so far, he’s had around twice as many runners as his best-represented rivals.
Of course, that numerical advantage has to be converted into winners, and Starman has made the most of his numbers with 11 winners in Britain and Ireland who have won 14 races between them. That puts him well clear of the other first-season sires, while his prize-money total – more than three times of that of his closest pursuer – again underlines his dominance.
Interestingly, his four highest-rated two-year-olds to date are all fillies. They are headed by Venetian Sun (101p) who was one of her sire’s most expensive yearlings and made it two out of two when winning the Albany Stakes in emphatic fashion. Chepstow maiden winner Flowerhead also excelled herself at Royal Ascot, finishing second at 100/1 in the Queen Mary Stakes. Irish filly Lady Iman (100) didn’t make the trip to Ascot, but she won her first three starts at home, including a listed race at the Curragh and the Group 3 Fillies Sprint Stakes at Naas when beating another daughter of Starman, Green Sense (96).
The rest of the first-season sires have had a handful of winners at most, but top-class miler Palace Pier is the one to pick out of the chasing pack. The fact that he’s holding his own against stallions with much more of a speedy and precocious profile at this stage of the season is very encouraging, and so is the fact that from just a dozen runners to date he has had five individual winners.
Appropriately enough, his first winner, Morris Dancer (85p), successful in a novice at Haydock at the end of May, is from the Gosden stable which also handled his sire. Both of Palace Pier’s highest-rated winners are out of Dubawi mares, the other being Newbury novice winner A Bit of Spirit (88p) who showed an excellent attitude when a head winner on his debut. Leicester maiden winner Sirius A (83p) is Palace Pier’s other leading winner on ratings at this stage but there should be plenty others to follow in the second half of the season.
Starman isn’t the only first-season with a pair of runners who have achieved Timeform ratings of 100 or more. Breeders’ Cup Mile winner Space Blues has the 101-rated pair Do Or Do Not and Power Blue who finished second and fifth respectively in the Coventry Stakes. Do Or Do Not started at 80/1 as the only maiden in the Coventry and could bid to go one better in next week’s July Stakes.
Other than Starman, the only other first-season sire with a black-type winner to his name in Britain or Ireland so far is Middle Park Stakes winner Supremacy. Bargain buy Anthelia (90), a £6,000 yearling, was her sire’s first runner when making a winning debut at Bath and she went on to complete a hat-trick when a 25/1 winner of the listed National Stakes at Sandown.
A’ali looked a good bet to make a quick start with his two-year-olds given he was all speed himself and a Royal Ascot winner at two in the Norfolk Stakes. He has four individual winners to date, headed by the filly Ali Shuffle (93) who was another to complete an early-season hat-trick, in the Lily Agnes Stakes at Chester.
The other sire now with four individual winners is very smart miler Lope Y Fernandez who doubled his tally with a couple of winners last Thursday. Both Canyouhearthedrums (68), the winner of a nursery at Yarmouth, and Newbury novice winner Lope El Fuego (78p) were cheap yearling purchases, though the latter then fetched 92,000 guineas at the breeze-ups.
A champion at two and unbeaten when top-class at three, St Mark’s Basilica was the most expensive of this year’s first-season sires, standing for €65,000 when his first crop was conceived. While he has only one winner on the board so far from 14 runners, Wetherby maiden winner Rogue Supremacy (86p), St Mark’s Basilica was always likely to make more of an impact in the second half of the season, and he has had plenty of runners looking open to improvement.
They include his highest-rated pair who both ran well in defeat at Royal Ascot where Thesecretadversary (99p) was runner-up in the Chesham Stakes and Cardiff By The Sea (95p) was fourth in the Queen Mary.
At the other end of the stallion market, mention should also go to smart middle-distance performer Bangkok, a son of Australia, who stands for just £3,000 and has had only three runners to date.
He was an unlikely type on paper to get an early two-year-old winner but did just that when Rising Empire (85p) won a maiden at Windsor in May for Andrew Balding (also Bangkok’s trainer) before running a good fifth in the Woodcote Stakes at Epsom.
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