Much in store for Bated Breath this year

The Racing Post's Aisling Crowe reviews the consistent sire who keeps on progressing.

Taken from The Racing Post, 12th January 2022, by Aisling Crowe:

In a starry Juddmonte stallion line-up which is heavy on leading men, the award for best supporting actor has to go to Bated Breath, playing the quietly underpinning role that draws you in while Frankel and Kingman go about their business as matinee idols.

Now 15, the son of Dansili - who died in the lead up to Christmas - stands for a career high fee of £15,000 in 2022 thanks to four seasons in which the Group 2 winner has established a reputation as a reliable source of classy performers at an affordable fee. Considering that Bated Breath was unraced at two, his ability to sire juvenile stakes winners who inherit their sire's toughness and longevity has to be one of the markers of his success.

His three-year-olds of 2022 were conceived on the back of a standout 2017 for their sire, while his two-year-old crop contains siblings to some of his early stars, so with that in mind 2022 is shaping up to be the year when Bated Breath claims some of the limelight for himself.

Bated Breath boasts a typically robust Juddmonte family as a half-brother to Dubai Duty Free winner Cityscape, who finished in the first three in six more Group 1 contests. Their dam Tantina, who produced just six foals before her premature death, won the Listed Oak Tree Stakes and Sceptre Stakes before producing four winners from as many runners.

Her first foal was the Listed-placed Daylami mare Scuffle, who is the dam of St Leger winner Logician and his Listed-winning brother Collide, as well as the North American Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed Suffused. Tantina is also second dam of the classy sprinter Equilateral and is a Distant View half-sister to the Chilean Listed winner Colonialism.

His second dam Didina is a Juddmonte homebred daughter of Nashwan and out of Didicoy, a Danzig granddaughter of the blue hen and Kentucky Broodmare of the Year Best In Show. It is one of the most illustrious female lines in the stud book.

In common with his wonderful sire, Bated Breath found a Group 1 win elusive and had to settle for five podium positions at the top level. A high-class sprinter, Bated Breath rattled off a hat-trick over six furlongs when he started his career at three for Roger Charlton, who also trained his granddam Didina.

As a four-year-old he earned his first stakes success in the Listed Leisure Stakes at Windsor, a prelude to the Golden Jubilee Stakes at nearby Ascot in which he was fifth to Society Rock on his first start in Group 1 company. He was narrowly defeated by Dream Ahead in both the July Cup and Haydock's Sprint Cup, before another agonisingly close second, this time in the Grade 1 Nearctic Stakes at Woodbine.

Returning to the track at five, he won the Temple Stakes from Sole Power and then suffered another narrow defeat in the King's Stand Stakes. In his final race, the Sprint Cup, Bated Breath came back from a near disastrous slip at the start to finish third to Society Rock. He ended his career with six wins and a further six placings from 18 starts.

Successful over five and six furlongs, he had an attractive commercial profile and began his stud career in 2013 marketed at a fee of £8,000, the same at which his own sire had been introduced.

In that first season he covered 147 mares, of which 94 were winners, 21 were black-type winners and eight were Group winners. This first crop produced in total 51 winners, with 19 individual two-year-old winners. The Queen Mary Stakes and Prix Robert Papin second Al Johrah and the Group 3-placed pair of Take A Deep Breath and Unabated were among those 19 first-crop juvenile winners.

Unabated went on to be Listed-placed at three, while Bated Breath added another stakes performer from his first crop with the Michael Seely Memorial Stakes third Sibilance.

His second crop produced his first Group 1 performer in Beckford, the winner of the Railway Stakes for Newtown Anner Stud who was also second in the Phoenix and National Stakes at the Curragh.

That cohort included Listed-winning juvenile Vik The Billy, Gavota, who was placed in the Rockfel Stakes and Oh So Sharp Stakes, plus Landshark, who was second in the Round Tower Stakes. From that second crop he has sired five individual stakes winners to date.

It took a few years but his third crop would yield his first top-flight winner - Juddmonte's homebred filly Viadera, who won the Grade 1 Matriarch Stakes at four for Chad Brown. Viadera is one of four stakes winners and 55 winners in total from Bated Breath's third crop.

The other standout horse from that crop is Space Traveller, who was second in the Prix Eclipse at two for Richard Fahey and Clipper Logistics. He then went on to defeat Space Blues in the Jersey Stakes and added the Boomerang Mile for good measure. Last year, at the age of five, he was transferred to the US and was second in the Grade 1 Woodbine Mile for Brendan Walsh.

One remarkable aspect to Bated Breath's success is his ability to sire horses able to adapt seamlessly to the rigours of racing in North America. Viadera gained her Grade 1 success at Del Mar, while he is also the sire of Graded or Listed winners stateside in Gift List, Tezzaray and Bipartisanship.

Unusually for a stallion in his third season, Bated Breath received a modest fee increase to £10,000 for 2015 and 2016. When the time came for the results of those liaisons to race, they produced nine stakes winners and counting.

His fee, which returned to £8,000 in 2017, was restored to £10,000 for the 2018 season off the back of that two-year-old crop which produced Beckford. The quality of the mares sent to him in 2018 was in line with those in his first couple of seasons and he covered 142 mares, 12 of whom were blacktype winners, including five at Group level.

The resulting foals are now three-year-olds of 2022. As juveniles, 55 of them ran, with 20 successful and two stakes winners in their midst. One of those is Sacred Bridge, a sister to Viadera who won the Round Tower Stakes at the Curragh for Ger Lyons and Juddmonte. The second juvenile to win at stakes level in 2021 is also a filly, Tezzaray, who was a Grade 3 winner at Del Mar in November.

Bated Breath is also sire of the exciting French Group 3-placed Batz, who is from the Ammerland family of Deutsches Derby-winning brother and sister Boreal and Borgia. Another juvenile daughter to earn black type in 2021 was Breeze Easy, who was placed in both the Rockingham and Radley Stakes for David Evans.

Sold by Brendan Holland's Grove Stud to Alex Elliott for £240,000 at the Tattersalls Ireland Breeze-Up, she was the sale's most expensive filly and subsequently resold for 250,000gns at the end of the season at the Tattersalls December Mares Sale. Juddmonte gelding Deodar was second in the Doncaster Stakes and is the best so far foaled by the Group 3 winner Tested.

Burney Falls, meanwhile, is a half-sister to Group 2 winner Excellent Result and Grade 3 winner Midnight Crossing, and showed some promise in maidens in Japan.

Of those who were unraced at two in 2021, there is a brother to Landshark who made 290,000gns as a yearling and is registered to Sheikh Ahmed Al Maktoum. Another to look forward to is Speak Softly, a half-sister to Grade 3 winner and Grade 1 third Vitalogy, while Silky Sue is a half-sister to Lyons' dual Group 3 winner and Coventry Stakes third Psychedelic Funk.

At Book 2 in 2020 Stroud Coleman went to 260,000gns for a Bated Breath half-brother to Molecomb Stakes winner and Middle Park third Rumble Inthejungle, consigned by Baroda Stud and now named Gun Salute.

A three-year-old colt by Bated Breath to look out for is Alzir, who is out of Across The Floor, a Juddmonte homebred half-sister to Grade 1 winner and sire Flintshire, by Bated Breath's sire Dansili.

His two-year-olds of 2022 include a pair of Book 1 yearlings in Taroka Stud's sister to Grade 3 winner Simply Breathless, who made 230,000gns to Stephen Hillen, and a three-parts brother to the Listed winner Stylistique. He was sold for 130,000gns by Baroda Stud to Ebonos.

The standout for Juddmonte is a three-parts sister to Dansili's Grade 1 Jenny Wiley Stakes winner Juliet Foxtrot, named Juliet Sierra. Self Centred has a two-year-old sister to Listed winner Feel Glorious, while Whatton Manor Stud produced a brother to Dahlia Stakes winner Worth Waiting who made 65,000gns to Blandford Bloodstock at Book 2 and is named Story Horse.