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Both Group 1 races at ParisLongchamp on Sunday went for export – one to Ireland, the other to England.
Joseph O’Brien won the St Marks Basilica Coolmore Prix St Alary with Above The Curve, owned by the Coolmore partners, in a race they sponsored.
Joseph, the older son of multiple-time Irish champion flat trainer, Aidan, had made the notable jockey booking of Ryan Moore for the three-year-old fillies’ race.
Above The Curve, a daughter of American Pharoah, was runner-up last time on the track in the Listed Cheshire Oaks in England. On Sunday, the filly, second for much of the race, was strong in the dying stages of the 1 mile 2 furlong contest as she moved clear of the field late in the home stretch.
The Coolmore-bred full sister to Group 3-placed Thinking Of You won by over a length from Place du Carrousel with Queen Trezy the same distance back in third.
The Group 1 Pretty Polly Stakes on Dubai Duty Free Irish Derby weekend at The Curragh is the next likely target for the Joseph O’Brien-handled filly. She also holds entries in both the Prix de Royallieu and Prix de Diane in France.
The winner is out of the Galileo mare Fabulous, an unraced sibling to Giant’s Causeway and top mare You’resothrilling, the dam of Group 1 winners Gleneagles, Happily, Joan of Arc and Marvellous, who are all sired by Galileo.
Above the Curve is a 28th stakes winner for Coolmore Stud’s American Pharoah and she is a fifth Group 1 for the US Triple Crown winner. The three-year-old filly is also the third stakes winner for American Pharoah from a daughter of Galileo.
The Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan over 1 mile 1 furlong for older horses was won by the Ed Walker trained five-year-old mare Dreamloper. The Irish-bred daughter of Ballylinch Stud’s Lope de Vega claimed a two-length success in the French capital.
It was a first win at the highest level for the mare that went into the race as a multiple Group winner.
The Group 1 Prix Rothschild and the Group 1 Prix Jean Romanet at Deauville were immediately mentioned post-race as possible targets for the English-trained winner. Her winning handler also suggested the Group 1 Nassau Stakes at the Goodwood Festival in England in August as a possible late summer target for the daughter of the stakes winningTeofilo mare Livia’s Dream.
Dreamloper is a 15th Group 1 success for the County Kilkenny-based Lope de Vega and the fourth for Teofilo as a broodmare sire. Teolfilo’s daughters have had much success so far this season, with the wins of Coroebus and Cachet to win this year’s QIPCO 2000 and 1000 Guineas at Newmarket, England.
Photo: Sky Sports Racing
