Star shuttle sire Shamardal dies

Cover image courtesy of Darley

When Darley Australia first announced the multiple Group 1 winner Shamardal (USA) was to make his way to the Hunter Valley in 2005 the response from breeders was phenomenal.

Darley Head of Sales Alastair Pulford said the reaction was like nothing he had witnessed before with the son of Giant’s Causeway (USA) selling himself at record pace.

“He was an amazing horse and he was different from other shuttle horses to start with because he retired late. He had won at the York meeting, Royal Ascot was run at York that year when they were renovating the grandstand,” he said.

“He won the St James’s Palace S. and was due to line up in the Eclipse S., which was going to be one of the races of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, but he went sore.

“They immediately decided to send him down here before he stood in the Northern Hemisphere and off that July announcement we literally filled him in a day. I’ve never had such a positive response to any stallion ever, then or since.

“We rang around our best clients and said are you interested and he was immediately popular and the timing was good.

“Giant’s Causeway had just been announced as not coming and Shamardal slipped right into his shoes and was a very high profile horse. He was very much like his uncle Street Cry, no nonsense and just went about his business and he was a very good doer and his progeny are pretty much the same.”

Shamardal’s shuttling days were curtailed when injury prevented his return in 2012.

“He was that popular from the word go and it was just a shame his injury entailed six months off and the vets told us years ago he was a season by season proposition and he lasted a lot longer than they predicted so we had the benefit of that,” Pulford said.

Shamardal won six of his seven starts, including four at Group 1 level – the Dewhurst S., the French 2000 Guineas, the Prix du Jockey Club and the St James’s Palace S.

The legacy continues at Darley with his top-class son Blue Point (Ire), a four-time Group 1 winning sprinter, to stand his first season in Australia in 2020.

First-crop star

Shamardal made an immediate impact in Australia through his first-crop daughter Faint Perfume, who was raced by his co-breeder the late Dato Tan Chin Nam and Dr Alan Jackson and wife Colleen.

She was trained by the late, great Bart Cummings to win the G1 VRC Oaks, the G1 Vinery Stud S. and was also runner-up in the G1 Australasian Oaks and third in the G1 Thousand Guineas.

“She was bred jointly by Dato Tan and Kia Ora Stud and was from the first crop to come through Think Big Stud, we had just bought the property,” said bloodstock agent Duncan Ramage, who at the time managed the stud and Dato Tan’s bloodstock portfolio.

“She was presented in the first draft from Think Big Stud and didn’t sell at Easter and we bought out Kia Ora. We took Dr Alan Jackson and his lovely wife Colleen to lunch with Dato and during the process of a Chinese lunch Alan found himself with half of a horse. At the time he wondered what he committed to, details were scant.”

Faint Perfume had been passed in for $40,000 at the Inglis Australian Yearling Sale and was subsequently sent to Cummings’ yard.

“Bart always said that she was small, but in fact she weighed a lot and was quite a heavy horse. She wasn’t that tall and the family tended to be a little bit short.

“She was a very strong horse and had a great constitution. She could a lot of work and her racing record shows that, she was able to turn up in two Oaks and all the lead-ups.”

Faint Perfume was a daughter of Zona (Zabeel {NZ}), who was a sister to the stakes winner Zingam and a half-sister to black type winner Banc De Fortune (Galileo {Ire}). Their dam Danendri (Danehill {USA}) won both the G1 Australian Oaks and the G1 Ansett Australia S.

“We only had about seven mares at the time and we bred three or four mares in partnership with Kia Ora. I think Zona was the only one to go to Shamardal and Bart bred a few to him,” Ramage said.

Gallery: Some of Shamardal’s major flagbearers in Australia

Among Shamardal’s other major flagbearers in Australia were the G1 Schweppes Oaks winner Maybe Discreet, G1 Darley Classic winner Delectation and the G1 Epsom H. winner Captain Sonador.

They made up 25 individual Group 1 winners for Shamardal, whose leading Northern Hemisphere lights include the multiple Group 1 winners Blue Point (Ire), Pinatubo (Ire), Speedy Boarding (GB), Earthlight (Ire) and the successful sire Lope De Vega (Ire).

The Australian-bred Able Friend won four Group 1 races in Hong Kong while Pakistan Star (Ger) won two top-flight events there and Dan Excel (Ire) won two Singapore Group 1 events and another in Hong Kong.

Shamardal's Group 1 winners