July 2022

THOROUGHBRED BREEDING INDUSTRY CELEBRATES BEST OF BRITISH AT THE TBA FLAT BREEDERS’ AWARDS SPONSORED BY THE JOCKEY CLUB & THE NATIONAL STUD

Stud owner Madeleine Lloyd Webber and tax expert Peter Mendham were the major surprise, and surprised, recipients of special honours at the Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association Flat Breeders’ Awards Evening, celebrating British-bred success in 2021 and held at Chippenham Park, near Newmarket, on Wednesday 6 July.

Lady Lloyd Webber, who founded the outstandingly successful Watership Down Stud at Burghclere, Newbury, with her husband Andrew in 1992, received the Andrew Devonshire Bronze, which recognises outstanding achievement and contribution to the British thoroughbred breeding industry.

Mendham, a longstanding and highly respected consultant with the law firm Allen & Overy, who stepped down from the TBA board in July 2021 after ten years, including acting as chairman of the Bloodstock Taxation Committee, was given the Dominion Bronze, which recognises outstanding contribution and long-term commitment from someone who has worked in the industry.

TBA chairman Julian Richmond-Watson said: “Madeleine and Peter are two very worthy recipients of the Devonshire and Dominion awards, reflecting their outstanding contribution and achievements in the industry. In creating and developing Watership Down Stud, Madeleine has produced a number top quality racecourse performers, many of whom are descended from her excellent foundation mare Darara. Her knowledge and passion for the thoroughbred is evident through the stud’s success which is making an indelible mark on the breed.

“Peter’s knowledge and skills have been vital to the racing industry for many years and critical to the TBA over the past few years, the industry is very much indebted to Peter for his time and wise counsel. His work on Brexit issues and the ramifications of Covid-19 are for which we are particularly thankful. As a trustee he has for a long time gone above and beyond to assist the association, working tirelessly to find solutions to the industry’s problems.”

Both awards, among 14 handed over at the event kindly sponsored by the Jockey Club, National Stud and drinks reception partner Newsells Park Stud, remained under wraps, even to the recipients, until the evening. Seven other category winners were drawn from nominated short lists and the remaining five had already been published.

Three special merit awards – the TBA Silver Salver, the Industry Merit award and the Filly of Merit award – went to HM The Queen, Chasemore Farm and Inspiral respectively.

The Queen, who is the TBA’s patron, preceded her Platinum Jubilee year with her most successful numerical Flat season as a breeder and owner. She received her award based on, amongst others, the achievements of Reach For The Moon, a son of Sea The Stars, who won two of his five races in 2021, including the Group 3 Betway Solario Stakes, and was second in the other three. Reach For The Moon is from the immediate family of the Queen’s Ribblesdale Stakes winner Phantom Gold, whose great grandam Amicable is one of only two female families surviving from the nine the Queen inherited in 1952.

Chasemore Farm, which began operating in 2011 as a commercial enterprise near Cobham in Surrey under the guidance of Betfair co-founder Andrew Black and his wife Jane, received the Industry Merit award for its support of people and industry initiatives.

Inspiral – winner of the Filly of Merit award sponsored by Goffs UK - bred and owned by the Cheveley Park Stud and trained by John and Thady Gosden in their first season with a joint licence, was the European champion two-year-old filly of 2021. Her unbeaten record of four wins in her juvenile season included the Group 1 bet365 Fillies’ Mile.

The two Breeders of the Year awards went to operators at either ends of the spectrum.

Overall winner of the TBA Silver Rose Bowl was former association chairman Kirsten Rausing, whose successes in a record-breaking 2021 for her green and white racing colours included the triple Group 1 winner Alpinista, while Zaaki, another graduate of her Lanwades Stud in Newmarket, achieved a similar feat in Australia.

The award for Small Breeder of the Year went to David Ward for the achievements of his Darley July Cup winner Starman, the second foal of his very first racehorse Northern Star.

The Broodmare of the Year award - sponsored by Barton Stud - was given to Aghareed, who has outrun her racing career as a Listed winner in France for the late Hamdan Al Maktoum by producing the outstanding brothers Baaeed and Hukum for the Shadwell operation.

It was a case of second time lucky for David Gardner in taking the TBA Stud Employee Award, after being among the runners-up last year. Appropriately, the award is sponsored by Gardner’s employer, New England Stud in Newmarket.

Of the five awards already revealed, Cable Bay’s success in the British EBF Stallion Special Merit Award honoured the Highclere Stud resident for his achievements in 2021, which were headed by the sprinters Dragon Symbol, King’s Lynn and Liberty Beach.

The remaining four awards were based on earnings in the case of Godolphin (the Queen’s Silver Cup as the leading breeder), Frankel (the BBA Silver Cigar Box as the leading stallion), and Ardad (the Tattersalls Silver Salver as the leading first-season sire), and individual winners for the Barleythorpe Stud Silver Cup given to Dubawi.

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