Kheleyf enjoyed the latest red-letter day of his sensational season by siring a double on Monday. These two winners both provided landmarks for their sire: Kheleyf’s Silver, winner of a five-furlong maiden at Windsor, became the stallion’s 30th individual winner, while Playfellow’s success in the Listed Silver Tankard Stakes at Pontefract took Kheleyf’s tally of Stakes winners to three.
The Paul Cole-trained Percolator got Kheleyf’s Stakes ball rolling earlier this season with a brace of wins in France – the Prix La Fleche and the G3 Prix du Bois – before Captain Ramius won the Star Appeal Stakes in Ireland earlier this month. And now Playfellow, winner now of three of his four starts, has followed suit. A son of the Halling mare Love And Affection, Playfellow races in the yellow and black livery of his owner Sheikh Ahmed bin Rashid al Maktoum, and had previously won at Haydock and Lingfield before finishing an excellent third in the G2 Champagne Stakes at Doncaster.
Kheleyf’s Silver’s success at Windsor the same afternoon saw the filly, a daughter of the Shadeed mare Silver Arrow who had cost €230,000 as a yearling, become Kheleyf’s 29th individual winner in Europe, making his tally 30 overall courtesy of an additional scorer in Japan. This places Kheleyf as the runaway leader in the numerical first-season sires’ table. This victory confirms Kheleyf’s Silver, who is raced by Sheikh Rashid bin Mohammed al Maktoum, as a pure speedster, and she looks sure to continue to shine in races where speed is the key.
