Study of Man

3.42 Newbury, Novice, 3yo, 10fT SHABAB AL AHLI (GB) (Frankel {GB}) is front and centre in Charlie Appleby's Derby plans at present, having won by 8 1/2 lengths on debut at Southwell in December and he has the chance to enhance his reputation in this important staging post used in the past by the Classic winners Hurricane Lane, Enable, Star Of Seville and Light Shift. Out of the Group 3 winner Koora (Pivotal), who has already produced two winners at that level in Klondike (Galileo) and Kemari (Dubawi), he encounters...

This column is not really supposed to start until the Flat turf season gets underway but we saw the sunshine in Newmarket on Monday morning for pretty much the first time this year so we're jumping the gun a little. After all, there was plenty of top-class Flat action on offer over the weekend in the Middle East and beyond, and following some frenetic race reporting on the spot in Riyadh, here are a few thoughts and breeding angles with the benefit of some time for reflection. Deep influence  With...

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia -- Members of the Heffernan family and their extended clan make it all look so easy. Turn up to a major race day somewhere in the world and leave with a big trophy and a bag of swag. OK, so it doesn't always go that smoothly but after last year's audacious Breeders' Cup Turf win for Ethical Diamond, the HOS Syndicate has done it again in the G2 Red Sea Turf Handicap, worth a cool $2.5m. Joseph O'Brien had two runners in the race but it was...

We're sliding down the scale slightly for this second part of our look at the sires standing across Europe to those with an advertised fee of £15,000 to £50,000 (approximately €17,000 to €57,000). And how can we not start with the champion sire of 2024, Dark Angel? At €45,000, his fee is the lowest it has been for a decade, and of course the years are marching on, but if there is one thing we have learnt about Dark Angel in his 18 seasons at Yeomanstown Stud it is that...

Kalpana's sire Study Of Man is set for a fee increase to £35,000 after the Lanwades Stud resident enjoyed another excellent year. Once again, Kalpana flew the flag for the Prix du Jockey Club winner when landing the Group 1 Qipco British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes for Andrew Balding and Juddmonte Farms. Meanwhile, Sea The Moon, the sire of five Group 1 winners, has been set at £20,000. Bobby's Kitten, who stood for nine years at Lanwades Stud, does not appear on the roster.

Francis Graffard has had his horses on song from early spring, and anyone who felt that the trainer surely could not maintain such a good run of form is now being proved wrong. He is so far clear of Andre Fabre in the French trainers' table that a first champion title for Graffard is starting to look a mere formality.  As if to underline his dominance, the trainer secured two more Group 1 victories on Sunday. Goliath struck in the Grosser Preis von Baden - a first top-level win for...

Juddmonte homebred Kalpana (Study Of Man) will follow the path of dual G1 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe heroine Enable (Nathaniel) when she lines up in the G3 September Stakes at Kempton next month before a start at ParisLongchamp. Already a winner of the 2024 edition, the G1 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes second was also under consideration for the G1 Prix Vermeille. Trained by Andrew Balding, the 2024 G1 British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes heroine has placed in all three 2025 starts, with a third in...

The victory of Allonsy in Sunday's Pontefract Castle Fillies' Stakes brought up a notable milestone for Lanwades Stud as the Study Of Man filly was the 100th Listed winner bred at the farm during the tenure of Kirsten Rausing.  The owner-breeder's association with the stud began in 1984 and during the intervening four decades 34 Group 1 winners have been bred at Lanwades, led by the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Alpinista (Frankel), along with 29 Group 2 and 41 Group 3 winners, bringing the total to 204 stakes...

Alpinista (GB), the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner and world champion racemare of 2022, has delivered her second foal, a colt by Lanwades' Study Of Man (Ire). The first foal of the daughter of Frankel (GB) is now a yearling filly by Dubawi (Ire) and Alpinista will travel next to France to visit Siyouni (Fr) at the Aga Khan Studs. Study Of Man, whose percentage of black-type winners was top among the second-season sires of 2024, will this year cover both Alpinista's dam Alwilda (GB) (Hernando {Fr}) and her...

It may not have been obvious at the time but with the benefit of almost 20 years' hindsight it is now clear that the retirement to stud in 2006 of both Dubawi (Ire) and Shamardal was a pivotal moment for the Darley operation, and indeed the European stallion scene. There is now no shortage of their male-line descendants at stud and, in Blue Point (Ire) and Too Darn Hot (GB) in particular, their legacy looks assured within the Darley ranks.  The pair ended last year as first and second in...

Moyglare Stud provided the jewels in the crown of the Goffs February Sale when two well-bred colts by hot stallions Blue Point (Ire) and Study Of Man (Ire) sold for a combined €415,000, which accounted for just over 10 per cent of the entire turnover at Kildare Paddocks this week.  It was the Blue Point colt out of Dansili (GB) mare Tina Angelina (Ire) who commanded a sale-topping €250,000 when selling to Tally-Ho Stud while Matt Coleman--signing under The Investors--landed the Study Of Man for €165,000.  All told, the turnover...

For this second instalment of our value sires series we are looking at stallions standing in the €20,000 to €49,999 fee range.  Another year has gone by in which Nathaniel (Ire) has provided us with one of the stars of the season. This time it was the Irish Oaks winner You Got To Me (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}), who later played a starring role of a different kind when topping the Tattersalls December Mares Sale at 4.8 million gns. She'll be in the Amo Racing silks next year and surely already...