Of all the young horses around the world sired by Darley stallions, few look to have more exciting prospects than this little beauty, a yearling by Dubawi from the Archregent mare Shady Stream. He’s currently enjoying the plentiful pasture as a boarder at Segenhoe Stud (NSW) but when his racing career begins he’s likely to be the centre of attention.
The colt was bred and is owned by Meringo Stud, one of the most successful breeding operations in the world over the past few years, and this yearling’s dam Shady Stream has been the star of their broodmare band. Initially famous for producing the world champion sprinter Takeover Target, she has now showed that that freakishly good galloper was no fluke, because her current three-year-old, the Street Cry colt Predatory Pricer, is also a genuine Group One galloper, as his last-start second in the Spring Champion Stakes at Randwick re-affirmed. Shady Stream is to visit Street Cry’s son, the Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense, this season.
Her current Dubawi yearling, whose conformation and physique appear hard to fault, clearly seems to have everything going for him, especially bearing in mind that members of the Dubawi’s first crop have been selling like hot cakes at the recent European yearling sales: by the end of Tattersalls October Sale Part 1, he had had 46 yearlings offered, of which 39 changed hands at an average of £91,395 (A$233,420). The top price was 420,000 gns (A$1,072,418), paid by agent Michael Goodbody on behalf of successful owner Thomas Barr, whose recent Ascot Group Three winner Kite Wood is currently one of the ante-post favourites for next year’s Derby. Such popularity is hardly surprising given Dubawi’s credentials on the racecorse. The first winner from the only crop of Sheikh Mohammed’s favourite horse, the late Dubai Millennium, Dubawi was an unbeaten Group One –winning two-year-old and went on to win the Irish 2,000 Guineas and Prix Jacques le Marois – France’s premier weight-for-age Group One mile contest which was also won by his sire.
Dubawi’s first Australian-bred yearlings will be appearing in the 2009 Yearling Sale series and they hail from some of the Australian studbbook’s finest families. Along with Shady Stream, other mares to have visited him during his first season at Darley Australia include the Group One winners Coco Cobanna and Perfect Promise. Classy Babe, the dam of Group One winner Devil Moon and Tennessee Blaze, whose son Apache Cat is another top-level winner were also among his first book, as was Shady Henrietta, a half-sister to Takeover Target and Predatory Pricer, whose colt foal is thus very closely related to the colt pictured here.
