19 Aug ‘Shaikh Nasser loved the horse ‘ – Victorious Racing secures €625,000 Siyouni filly at Arqana

Shaikh Nasser Bin Hamad Al Khalifa’s Victorious Racing entered the market at Arqana on Monday when bidding €625,000 for the Siyouni half-sister to Prix de Malleret scorer Babylone. The filly was bred by Haras Voltaire and sold through Haras d’Etreham.

There is plenty of black type on the page, with the dam being a daughter of the Niarchos family’s Prix Marcel Boussac winner Denebola. In turn she is out of the increasingly influential Coup De Genie, a sister to Machiavellian and ancestress of top-flight winners like Bago, Emollient and Maxios.

“She’s staying here in France and going to Yann Lerner,” said Billy Jackson-Stops, racing manager to Victorious Racing. “She was a selection between myself, Yann and the boss, Shaikh Nasser. All three of us were very keen on her. We’ve tried on a few today but we’ve been strict on our valuations and didn’t quite get close to what we wanted.

“We were very, very keen on this filly so we pushed a little further than we wanted to. We’re looking for stock that can be retired into the broodmare band and grow that side of things. With that pedigree, that’s what appealed.

“She’s got it all; there’s a lot of stakes winners in the family, and we obviously liked her as a type. Yann is a very good trainer and he loved the horse, I loved the horse and, most importantly, Shaikh Nasser loved the horse. If he’s happy, we’re happy, and he really wanted her as part of the broodmare band in the future.”

Jackson-Stops explained that Shaikh Nasser, whose colours have been carried to notable successes by the likes of Bay City Roller, Bradsell and Isle Of Jura, was establishing a high-end breeding programme.

The Barton Stud-based broodmare band already includes Battle Rhythm, an unraced Dubawi half-sister to Bucanero Fuerte who topped the 2023 August Sale at €2,400,000, and will be added to when Fred Darling Stakes scorer Duty First retires at the end of the campaign.

“He has a handful of broodmares already, between 15 and 18, and there’s some exciting stuff there,” said Jackson-Stops. “Duty First will join the broodmare band at the end of this year, for example, so those numbers will grow.”

He added: “Sadly [Battle Rhythm] got a bit of an injury in training. She’s a lovely type but she’s been retired to the paddocks. She was going very well but now we’ll have to start thinking about mating for her. Shaikh Nasser is building a really nice band of mares and that’s something we’ll look to build on going forward.”