New Bay

Thanks to the TDN, I am able to tell you that the pedigrees of the exciting GI Kentucky Derby and GI Preakness S. hero American Pharoah and the highly regarded Japanese Derby winner Duramente are both worthy of the Werk Nick Rating of A+++–the treasured “Triple Plus.” Of the year's other recent Classic winners, the G1 1,000 Guineas winner Legatissimo has an A+ rating and she is followed by the G1 Japanese Oaks winner Mikki Queen and the G1 Poule d'Essai des Pouliches heroine Ervedya, both of whom have A ratings.

However, the recent Classics also show that it is possible (and sometimes essential) to venture off the well-trodden, proven route every now and again. The G1 Irish 1,000 Guineas winner Pleascach has a Werk Rating of C, the impressive G1 Poule d'Essai des Poulains winner Make Believe is a B and Sunday's G1 Prix du Jockey-Club winner New Bay is a B+, as is the tough Gleneagles, winner of the G1 2,000 Guineas in England and Ireland.

When I put forward the mating suggestions for Juddmonte's European mares for the 2011 season, my preferred choice for New Bay's dam Cinnamon Bay was Invincible Spirit, with Dubawi a highly likeable second option.

The Invincible Spirit suggestion would probably have been a good one, as Cinnamon Bay's three-parts-sister Zenda was carrying a foal by the Irish National Stud stallion which turned out to be Kingman, last year's European Horse of the Year. Prince Khalid, though, preferred the Dubawi option and his decision has been completely vindicated, not only by New Bay's victory in the “French Derby” but also by his eye-catching second behind Make Believe from a bad draw in the Poulains.

In doing the Juddmonte matings, General Manager Philip Mitchell insists that considerable emphasis is placed on conformation, as well as on pedigree. With Cinnamon Bay the physical requirement was to find a stallion capable of supplying some of the substance and strength that this daughter of Zamindar lacked as a youngster. Although correct and attractive, Cinnamon Bay had always been rather unfurnished and–in common with plenty of Zamindar's daughters, including Zenda–she had also been quite narrow as a youngster. On the plus side, Cinnamon Bay possesses some size and scope, and it was hoped that she would complement Dubawi's compact physique, which features a muscular body and powerful quarters. For once, the theory has proved spot on.

There was also some encouragement on the pedigree front. By the time the mating with Dubawi was arranged, this outstanding stallion had only two crops of racing age. Only one of his foals was out of a Zamindar mare, but he had three foals out of mares by Zamindar's brother Zafonic and all three had won and one of them, the French filly Split Trois, had won the G3 Prix Eclipse as a 2-year-old.

Since then the Dubawi-Zafonic partnership has improved its statistics to five winners from five starters, with Muraaqaba becoming the cross's second group-winning 2-year-old. New Bay is only Dubawi's second starter out of a Zamindar mare, the next in the pipeline being the French-trained Zarak, a 2-year-old colt out of the Aga Khan's magnificent filly Zarkava.

One aspect of the Dubawi-Cinnamon Bay mating which appealed to me was that it produced second lines to three of Cinnamon Bay's four great-grandsires. What's more, these three stallions were the phenomenally successful Mr. Prospector, Northern Dancer and Mill Reef–stallions who respectively achieved Average Earnings Indices of 3.91, 4.11 and 4.49.

It is virtually a given that any top winner by Dubawi will have at least two lines to the ubiquitous Northern Dancer, and a double presence of Mr. Prospector is also becoming increasingly common among Dubawi's Group 1 winners, other examples in 2015 being the Dubai World Cup winner Prince Bishop (4×4) and the fast Australian filly Shamal Winds (4×3).

A second line to Mill Reef is also quite common among his group winners. Mill Reef is frequently doubly represented via his best stallion son Shirley Heights, as with the Group 1 winners Al Kazeem and Hunter's Light, but others are inbred directly to Mill Reef. Coincidentally the recent G1 Lockinge S. winner Night of Thunder, conqueror of Kingman in the 2014 2,000 Guineas, also has duplications to Mill Reef, Northern Dancer and Mr. Prospector within the first five generations.

To get back to New Bay's dam Cinnamon Bay, she wasn't as good as Zenda, her Classic-winning three-parts-sister, but she was still well above average. Her three-race juvenile career yielded a win over a mile at Chantilly, plus a close second to the future Group 1 winner Coquerelle. She later started at 14-1 for the G1 Prix de Diane on the strength of an unbeaten start to her second season, including a three-length listed victory.

Unfortunately Cinnamon Bay didn't run well enough in the Diane to establish whether her stamina stretched to an extended mile and a quarter. However Dubawi sires a wide range of high-class performers and New Bay clearly has no problems with the distance. Whether a colt with such a good burst of acceleration will stay a mile and a half, only time will tell, but there is an encouraging amount of stamina to be found in his female line.

His second dam, the Sadler's Wells mare Trellis Bay, earned her black type when second in a listed race over two miles and she subsequently passed on a generous share of her stamina to Bellamy Cay. This son of the champion miler Kris stayed well enough to become a Group 2 winner over a mile and three-quarters and to finish a close second in the G1 Prix Royal-Oak over nearly two miles. Trellis Bay's sister Coraline was an even better source of stamina, producing three group-winning stayers in Reefscape (G1 Prix du Cadran over two and a half miles), Martaline and Coastal Path (who, like Reefscape, was placed in the Ascot Gold Cup).

New Bay's third and fourth dams, the Mill Reef mare Bahamian and the Busted mare Sorbus, also possessed plenty of stamina, in addition to plenty of class. Bahamian once crossed the line first in a Group 2 over 1 7/8 miles, and Sorbus numbered a second in the Irish St Leger among her achievements. Sorbus had earlier finished second in the Irish 1,000 Guineas and been demoted after crossing the line a length clear in the Irish Oaks, so she was very versatile.

The Bahamian female line has developed into one of the most potent families in the Juddmonte stud book, with New Bay being the latest in a long line of important winners. Four of Bahamian's daughters now have at least one Group 1-winning descendant. In addition to Coraline and Trellis Bay, they are the Irish Oaks winner Wemyss Bight (dam of Beat Hollow) and Wemyss Bight's sister Hope (dam of the very successful stallion Oasis Dream and Zenda and second dam of Kingman).

PRIX DU JOCKEY CLUB-G1, €1,500,000, CHY, 5-31, 3yo, c/f, 10 1/2fT, 2:05.69 (NRR), gd/sf.
1–#@NEW BAY (GB), 128, c, 3, by Dubawi (Ire)
     1st Dam: Cinnamon Bay (GB) (SW-Fr), by Zamindar
     2nd Dam: Trellis Bay (GB), by Sadler's Wells
     3rd Dam: Bahamian (Ire), by Mill Reef
O-Khalid Abdullah; B-Juddmonte Farms Ltd (GB);
T-Andre Fabre; J-Vincent Cheminaud. €857,100.
Lifetime Record: 4 starts, 2 wins, 2 places,
€1,005,630. Werk Nick Rating: B+. Click for the
eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.Click for the Racing Post result or the free brisnet.com catalogue-style pedigree. Video, sponsored by Fasig-Tipton.