Everybody needs good neighbours, as the theme tune goes, and that’s exactly what Cheveley Park Stud has been to Darley for decades. On either side of Duchess Drive in Newmarket, the two studs are rivals to an extent, but also friends and even, on occasion, partners.
When one thinks of Cheveley Park Stud, it is impossible not to reflect on the incredible success story of David and Patricia Thompson’s homebred stallion Pivotal.
“He came at a very good time, actually,” says Mrs Thompson of the late sire. “When he started off, he didn’t have the biggest book of mares.”
Cheveley Park’s managing director Chris Richardson adds: “It was 56 mares in his first year, and then from that he just kept producing these wonderful Group winners that kept getting better with age. And then in 2005, 25% of the horse was sold to Sheikh Mohammed, which meant that we solidified the partnership that we had with Darley.”
While Sheikh Mohammed’s team has benefited by breeding the G1 winners Farhh, Addeybb, Blair House and Avilius by Pivotal, so too has the Thompson family enhanced its own breeding operation by using stallions just across the road. Medicean, one of the Thompsons’ eight winners of the G1 Lockinge Stakes and a son of Darley’s Machiavellian, served a very useful career back in the Cheveley Park stallion wing, his offspring including roster mate Dutch Art and dual G1 winner Nannina.
Mrs Thompson says: “We took on Dutch Art, and his fertility waned, but what a phenomenal broodmare sire he’s turning out to be. We’ll hang on to our Dutch Art mares, that’s for sure.” Cheveley Park’s remarkable success with the Lockinge continued into the 2024 season, when Iffraaj’s son Audience delivered something of a surprise, later backed up by victory in the G2 Lennox Stakes at Glorious Goodwood.
“First of all I thought it’s a shame that a gelding is winning a G1,’ she laughs, “but of course I was very happy. We do need a few more stallions though, especially to be kept in this country.”
With the broodmare band having been ‘tidied up’ over the last five years, around 50 foals are expected next spring at Cheveley Park, among them the first out of the G2 winner Sacred, who came within a neck of winning the G1 Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot. The daughter of Exceed And Excel is in foal to Blue Point, who also won that race.
The legion of top-class race fillies to have carried the famously patriotic red, white and blue silks of Cheveley Park Stud also includes yearling purchase Russian Rhythm, and the homebred daughter of Singspiel, Confidential Lady.
Even they have perhaps been eclipsed by the star retiree to the broodmare ranks this year: six-time G1 winner Inspiral.
“We bought our first horse in 1966 and Inspiral’s the best we’ve bred. I know we bred Pivotal as well, and others, but she’s certainly been the most successful,” says Mrs Thompson. “She’s one you dream about. “It is probably the mares who give me the most enjoyment. I love being able to wander around the stud and see the mares and foals.”
