John Ingles looks at the pedigree of top two-year-old Little Big Bear, the best in his family since his Arc-winning great grandam.
No Nay Never’s summer has only got better since his success this season was covered here only a month or so ago. For a start, his sons Little Big Bear and Blackbeard have duly gone on to win both the Group 1 contests for two-year-olds that have been run so far, the Phoenix Stakes and Prix Morny respectively. But as well as Blackbeard’s win at Deauville last weekend, following in the footsteps of his sire who also won the Morny, two more Ballydoyle two-year-olds by No Nay Never, Aesop’s Fables and Meditate, won Group 2 contests at the Curragh which could put them too on course for Group 1 success in the autumn.
But of all of No Nay Never’s good two-year-olds this year, it’s Little Big Bear who has made much the biggest impression with a hugely impressive seven-length win in the Phoenix, earning a Timeform rating of 126p that already looks worthy of a champion two-year-old.
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Little Big Bear was out early and, after a narrow defeat on his debut in April, he has now won all four of his starts since, the first two over five furlongs, including the Windsor Castle Stakes, and the last two over six furlongs.
Judged on that precocious and speedy record so far, it would be easy to imagine that Little Big Bear is an out-and-out sprinter on pedigree. But, in fact, nothing could be further from the truth. On his dam’s side, he comes from a family of middle-distance performers which strongly suggests that six furlongs won’t prove the limit of his stamina. Not only that, his great grandam is one of the best fillies in Timeform’s experience.
All Along was a top-class racemare who enjoyed her best season as a four-year-old in 1983 when earning a rating of 134. Trained by Patrick Biancone for Daniel Wildenstein, France’s leading owner on nine occasions, All Along had been good enough at three to win the Prix Vermeille and finish a close second in the Japan Cup. But it was not until late the following year that she really began to blossom.
For most horses, winning the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe is the culmination of their season, but for All Along her victory at Longchamp was just the beginning of a remarkable autumn campaign. The Arc field had both quantity and quality, with the 26 runners having won 38 pattern races between them during the current season. Fillies ended up taking five of the first six places, with All Along getting a clear run from off the pace and showing a fine turn of foot to beat the Oaks and St Leger winner Sun Princess by a length.
With the inaugural Breeders’ Cup still a year away, the big attraction for turf horses across the Atlantic in the autumn of 1983 was the newly created International Classic Series. As well as being valuable contests in their own right, the Rothmans International at Woodbine in Canada, the Turf Classic at Aqueduct and the Washington D. C. International at Laurel, offered a million-dollar bonus to any horse winning all three races. A gap of just two weeks between each race made for a tough schedule but All Along swept aside the opposition in all three contests, her easiest win coming in the Turf Classic which she won by almost nine lengths.
‘It would be all but impossible to surpass and very difficult to equal her brilliant autumn campaign’ concluded Racehorses, ‘and it is good news indeed that she stays in training.’ As it turned out, All Along didn’t show the same form at five but still managed to finish third in the Arc and was then beaten only a neck in the first running of the Breeders’ Cup Turf.
All Along was a strong, attractive individual and in Timeform’s opinion the pick on looks of the ten fillies who contested the Arc that she won. As a broodmare, however, All Along’s stud record was a disappointment given what she had achieved on the track. She produced 13 foals but only four of them were winners and the only one of any real note was her very first foal.
Given the rather uninspired name of Along All, he was the rare product of two Arc winners as his sire was Mill Reef. Along All finished second in France’s top two-year-old race, the Grand Criterium, but didn’t really progress at three although successful in the Group 2 Prix Greffulhe. Since Along All, it has taken the family more than 30 years to come up with another Group winner in the rather surprising form of a high-class sprinting two-year-old.
All Along’s granddaughter Adventure Seeker, by the Prix du Jockey Club winner and Arc runner-up Bering, was among her more successful descendants, though, as she was a listed winner at Longchamp and runner-up in the Group 3 Prix de Cleopatre at Saint-Cloud, both races at around a mile and a quarter, earning a smart Timeform rating of 115.
Little Big Bear is her fifth winner after Andrea Mantegna, a winner in France in the Wildenstein colours before enjoying further success in Australia; American Graffiti, a useful winner for Godolphin in both Britain and Dubai; and the fair handicappers Soyounique and Vin Rouge who have both been successful this summer. Four-year-old gelding Vin Rouge (by Zoffany), a two-mile winner on the Flat, won over hurdles at Fontwell this week ahead of a possible date at Tattersalls’ August Sale, so Adventure Seeker’s offspring have been a mixed bunch to say the least.
Adventure Seeker, then aged eight and in foal to Siyouni (the foal she was carrying was Soyounique), featured among the 108 horses – foals, yearlings, horses in training and broodmares – who were offered for sale at Goffs during the autumn of 2016 in the Wildenstein Stables Ltd Dispersal which ended an era, spanning almost a hundred years, of winners in the famous royal blue colours with the light blue cap.
The highest-profile lot in the sale was Beauty Parlour, winner of the 2012 Poule d’Essai des Pouliches. In foal to Kingman, she duly proved the most expensive purchase at the dispersal when selling to American owner Peter Brant for €1.6 million. Best known since his return to ownership as the owner of Arc winner Sottsass, Brant was the main buyer at the sale, with his other purchases including the future US Grade 1 winners Raging Bull and Blowout, the latter a daughter of Beauty Parlour by Dansili who was only a foal at the time of her purchase.
Another Brant purchase which has paid dividends was that of the broodmare Bonanza Creek. She is now the dam of Stone Age, who looked a leading Derby contender after winning his trial at Leopardstown impressively, and two-year-old filly Sandy Creek who made a very promising debut when second at the Curragh in June.
But thanks to Little Big Bear, it could well be Adventure Seeker who proves the best buy of all from the Wildenstein dispersal, though she wasn’t among Brant’s purchases and went instead to Brendan Bashford Bloodstock on behalf of Tipperary breeders Camas Park Stud and Summerhill for €125,000. They sold Little Big Bear at Deauville last year for €320,000 and have a couple of full brothers to him, a yearling and a foal, coming through.
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