Page 23 - Demo

nh racing
There was also the Grade 2 victory with Aspire Tower in the Knight Frank Juvenile Hurdle (G2).
The 150-rated Notebook is an improving seven-year-old son of Samum, out of the Winged Love mare Nova. It is essentially a staying Flat pedigree – Notebook’s half- brother Nebukadnezar (Lomitas) was a Listed winner over 1m6f in Italy.
Bred by Gestüt Am Schlossgarten, Notebook was bought as a foal for €27,000 by JD Leahy from Corrin Stud at the Goffs December Sale in 2013. After winning his third start in a point-to-point he was offered at the Cheltenham May Sale where he was purchased by Mags O’Toole for £70,000 from John Nallen.
It was an inspired purchase – Notebook has only once in nine subsequent starts finished out of the first two places (when down the field in the Ballymore Novices Hurdle (G1)). He has gone through the ranks nicely now he has switched to fences, his Grade 1 Christmas success represents strong novice form and he
is now a 5/1 shot for the Arkle.
Born To Sea is beginning to get some traction asasireof jumps’ horses
The Bromhead-trained A Plus Tard is already a Festival winner having taken the Close Brothers Novices’ Handicap Chase under Blackmore last spring.
He continued to build on that performance at Punchestown last April when third in the Group 1 novice chase and then again
this season when second
in the Fortrina Chase (G1) before gaining his deserved top level win.
He will have a Festival
entry in the Champion Chase, but De Bromhead is leaning toward the longer Ryanair Chase
Clan Des Obeaux wining his second King George VI Chase
for the Mme Henri Devin-bred and Cheveley Park Stud-owned six-year-old.
Boosting a French suffix A Plus Tard is out of the country’s leading NH sire Kapgarde and it was a strong Grade 1 Christmas
period for the son of Garde Royale – Fakir D’Oudairies finished second to Notebook, Dolos won early December’s Tingle Creek (G1) for trainer Paul Nicholls, while his highlight came on Boxing Day with Clan Des
Obeaux’s storming 21l King George VI Chase victory. The disappointing performance of Lostintranslation (subsequently given a wind operation) meant that French-breds filled the first three places in the Kempton Boxing Day feature.
The 21-year-old Kapgarde stood at his highest-registered fee of €12,000 last year, but his stock have been repaying his previous breeders and investors in the sale ring last year.
At the Cheltenham December Sale, Betrand Le Metayer spent £210,000 (third top price) on the three-year-old gelding Kalkas, placed on his sole outing over hurdles in France, at the Arqana Autumn Mixed Sale Saubouas Bloodstock went to a yearling top-price of €150,000 for the colt out of
No News (Gentlewave).
Flash De Touzaine cost Tom Malone/ Paul Nicholls £125,000 at Cheltenham last May, while at the same venue’s November
Sale, Kate Harrington went to £120,000 for Monbeg Stables’s point-to-point graduate
Lifetime Ambition.
At the 2019 Derby Sale, Highflyer
Bloodstock/Ben Pauling Racing bought Gentleman Valley for €130,000. He is out of a Lando half- sister to the French Grade 2 winner
Pindare.
Although Irish-born and originally
retired to stand in the Emerald Isle, Born To Sea, the Invincible Spirit
half-brother to Sea The Stars, moved to stand in France at Haras des Faunes in 2019 at a fee of €4,000, a price that has
been held for 2020.
The stallion has been a disappointing
producer of high-grade Flat horses, but as he seemingly produces stock with a preference for a softer surface (hence
the move to France), Born To Sea is beginning to get some traction as a sire
of jumps’ horses.
The De Bromhead-trained
Aspire Tower, who is out of the Pivotal mare Red Planet, was the impressive 18l winner of the Knight Frank Juvenile Hurdle (G2). The gelding was a useful enough campaigner
on the Flat (rated 86), but really has found his feet over timber. He is currently heading to The Festival as a market leader for the Triumph Hurdle
(G1).
De Bromhead stated after the
gelding’s Christmas victory that there maybeanoptiontotakeinaGrade1en
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