Shamardal’s eldest runners in Europe have only just turned three but they are so far showing every indication that they mean to carry on as they did last year when his first crop made him champion freshman sire.
Shamardal currently lies third on the all-weather sires’ list behind Bertolini and Exceed And Excel and has a whopping 63 per cent winners to runners strike rate. Five of his eight representatives have won so far this year, including Texas Queen, who scored twice in January for Mick Channon and Rabbah Bloodstock and was also placed on four occasions as a juvenile.
Other notable winners in January include High Constable, a half-brother to the Group One winner Right Approach and bred by HM The Queen from the Shadeed mare Abbey Strand.
The Mark Johnston-trained Secretive is another one for the 2010 notebook. His one run to date, on 22 December, resulted in a three-length strike at Southwell and he holds an entry for the £250,000 Tattersalls Timeform 3-Y-O Trophy to be run at Newmarket in April.
Fans of three-day eventing will have enjoyed the win of Burghley at Wolverhampton on 11 January. The Shamardal gelding is out of the G1 Cheveley Park Stakes place-getter Badminton and won on his debut in impressive fashion from Duellist, a Dubawi half-brother to Lujain.
