Merchant Navy takes Coolmore Stud Stakes with dramatic late finish
The Coolmore Stud Stakes (registered as Ascot Vale Stakes) (Gr 1, 1200m) is now recognised as one of Australia’s stallion making races.
Originally for two-year-olds and named the Ascot Vale Stakes, it became a major sprint contest for three-year-olds in 1969 with that year’s winner, champion sire Vain (Wilkes), establishing a high standard at stud for later winners to emulate.
Among those later winners to match or better Vain’s breeding influence are champion sires Century (Better Boy) and Encosta De Lago (Fairy King) while a number of others such as Kaapstad (Sir Tristram), Zeditave (The Judge) and Bureaucracy (Lord Ballina) have been very useful sires.
More recent Coolmore Stud Stakes winners include Northern Meteor (Encosta De Lago), Star Witness (Starcraft) and Sepoy (Elusive Quality) while awaiting judgement are the 2013 winner Zoustar (Northern Meteor), 2014 winner Brazen Beau (I Am Invincible) plus last year’s winner Flying Artie (Artie Schiller), currently standing his first season at Newgate Farm in NSW.
Last Saturday’s renewal of the Coolmore Stud Stakes attracted a field of 20 down the straight course at Flemington and was among the most competitive and memorable as it produced a dramatic finish with superbly bred colt Merchant Navy (Fastnet Rock) darting through on the rails close to home to down the favourite, the filly Invincible Star (I Am Invincible), by a head with another high class filly, Formality (Fastnet Rock), just a short head away in third in a time of 1:09.10.
Merchant Navy had won his first four starts, two in black type company, but failed badly at his previous start in the ATC Golden Rose (Gr 1, 1400m) in Sydney on 23 September, but the blinkers added here and a freshen up enabled him to turn around his form and likely cement a future spot on the Coolmore Stud stallion roster as a successor to his father Fastnet Rock (Danehill), twice champion sire in Australia and already represented by successful young sire sons Hinchinbrook, Foxwedge, Smart Missile, Stryker and Your Song.
Saturday was another landmark day for Fastnet Rock as he also supplied three-year-old filly Shoals who defeated older mares to win the Myer Classic (registered as Empire Rose Stakes) (Gr 1, 1600m) to become the sire’s 31st Group One winner among a grand total of 123 stakes winners worldwide.
Bred by Queensland resident Chris Barham who raced his dam Legally Bay (Snippets), a multiple stakes winner, Merchant Navy is essentially a product of NSW as he was conceived at Coolmore and born and reared at Segenhoe Stud, Scone, making $350,000 when included in Segenhoe’s draft at the 2016 Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale in Sydney.
He is raced by a high powered syndicate which includes Coolmore, several people closely associated with Coolmore and Segenhoe manager Peter O’Brien who was deeply impressed by the colt from his earliest days and determined to take a share when he was sold.
Merchant Navy’s dam Legally Bay was among the best juvenile fillies of her generation and later was able to match it with Australia’s top sprinters, placing second in the T J Smith Stakes (then Gr 2, 1200m) and third in both the Oakleigh Plate (Gr 1, 1100m) and the Australia Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m).
Legally Bay comes from an outstanding female line and has proved a fine producer, especially when bred to Fastnet Rock. Before Merchant Navy, her ninth foal, she bred Jolie Bay (Fastnet Rock), winner of the ATC Roman Consul Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m) and runner-up in the Coolmore Stud Stakes and stakes-placed Zara Bay (Fastnet Rock), a metropolitan winner in Sydney and Melbourne. Two other good winners out of the mare are Maroon Bay (Exceed And Excel) and Carbon Taikun (Lonhro).
Back in 1995 this writer was advising champion Brisbane trainer, the late Bruce McLachlan, in finding a filly for his client Ron Gilbert at the Inglis Easter Yearling Sale and we were able to buy Legally Bay’s dam Decidity (Last Tycoon) who turned out to be a handy performer before becoming an even better broodmare as the mother not only of Legally Bay but also of five other winners headed by Group One winner Bonaria (Redoute’s Choice) and Group Three winner Time Out (Rory’s Jester).
Decidity is also second dam of Group Three winners Tessera (Medaglia d’Oro) and Montsegur (New Approach) so she has made her mark at stud.
This is an excellent family as Decidity is a half-sister to Classy Fella (Kenmare), a three-time stakes winner, and closely related to black type winners Twirled (Turf Ruler) and Noted (Vain). Class (Twig Moss), the third dam of Merchant Navy, is out of Pirouette (Planet Kingdom), a sister to two top class performers in Our Planet (Planet Kingdom) and Gypsy Kingdom (Planet Kingdom) and a three-quarter sister-in-blood to Group One-winning sire Ideal Planet (Planet Kingdom) descending from stakes winning imported mare Gypsy Moss (Mossborough).
Other notable winners from the family are Innocent King (Tolomeo), winner of the AJC Derby (Gr 1, 2400m) and the Rosehill Guineas (Gr 1, 2000m) and Royal Snack (Lunchtime), a multiple stakes winner of 15 races.
Merchant Navy certainly has the depth of pedigree to become a good sire with four crosses of Northern Dancer (Nearctic), a 5f x 4f double of the good Australian sire Twig Moss (Luthier) and further duplications of influential American sires Buckpasser and his father Tom Fool (Menow). A distant double of breed shaper Star Kingdom (Stardust) and at least 13 lines of unbeaten Nearco (Pharos) in Merchant Navy’s background can only enhance his chances of proving successful at stud.