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Hungry Heart becomes Juddmonte-based sire’s 13th top-flight winner

Juddmonte Farms’ star stallion Frankel (Galileo) notched up his second Australian Group 1 winner and 13th overall when the Chris Waller-trained Hungry Heart (3 f ex Harlech by Pivotal) landed a much deserved victory at Group 1 level when she took out the Vinery Stud Stakes (registered as Storm Queen Stakes) (Gr 1, 2000m) at Rosehill on Saturday. 

Harmony Rose (Glass Harmonium) made the running, with Kerrin McEvoy placing Hungry Heart at the back. As the field came round the turn, Hungry Heart was caught very wide, but flew down the outside closing the gap with every stride to eventually beat Harmony Rose by a head. Impecunious (Sacred Falls) was a further two and three-quarter lengths away in third. 

Hungry Heart won the Sweet Embrace Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m) in February last year and ran well in the autumn when finishing second in the Furious Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m), Tea Rose Stakes (Gr 2, 1400m) and Flight Stakes (Gr 1, 1600m). 

The three-year-old filly resumed this preparation with a seventh place finish in the Light Fingers Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m), before placing eighth in the Surround Stakes (Gr 1, 1400m), but signalled she was back to something like her old form when claiming the Phar Lap Stakes (Gr 2, 1500m) on her previous start on March 13 and Waller said he was confident coming into Saturday’s race.

"It was a great win, it was a great race to watch,” he said. “She was back and at least they ran along quick so it gave the backmarkers their chance. But gee, with 300 metres to run I could see her making her run but it was starting to tell. There was a lot of ground to make up but the last 100 metres she really fought hard and got there quite well."

On the filly coming from off the pace, Waller said: “You just don't panic and there's no reason to change things. Whether it be leading into a race and we backed ourselves going for the Phar Lap and thinking it might get some confidence back. 

“I just cannot explain how much it does with horses, jockeys, people. No matter what sport you're in, or even just everyday life what confidence does. I think that win last start was a big help, and to me today that last 100 metres she could've easily run second but she really stuck her head out and tried her guts out. So it was pretty brave."

Bred by Yulong, the filly was bought back by Damon Gabbedy’s Belmont Bloodstock Agency at the 2019 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale being knocked down for $300,000 and the operation’s chief operating officer Sam Fairgray told Racing & Sports Bloodstock he was pleased to see the filly finally get her day in the sun. 

“She has been very consistent throughout her career and it is great for her to get the Group 1 today,” he said. “Mr Zhang bred her and we took her to Magic Millions and he said to buy her back if she didn’t make $300,000 or more, so we did and gave her to Chris Waller. 

“Early on Chris earmarked her as a nice filly and he has managed her really well and congratulations to him and his team for getting the result today. 

“Mr Zhang has been a fan of Frankel for a long time and she was a very athletic filly as a yearling. She had a lot of quality and moved well. From what she did as a two-year-old you always thought as a three-year-old she would improve and we are seeing that now. 

“The Vinery has been the aim this campaign. She ran on those wet tracks earlier on and she ran OK without really performing to her level and when she got back on to the dry tracks at her last start, she got her confidence back and she showed a great turn of foot to come from last as she did today.”

Hungry Heart is out of British-bred Pivotal (Polar Falcon) mare Harlech, who was herself purchased by Seamus Mills Bloodstock and Yulong at the 2016 Tattersalls July Sale for 60,000gns. 

Yulong subsequently offered her carrying the filly at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Broodmare Sale and she failed to make her $540,000 reserve. 

Harlech herself is out of Listed winner Zoowraa (Azamour), making her a half-sister to Grade 3 winner Maamora (Dubawi). 

The filly’s third dam is the Group 3-winning Beraysim (Lion Cavern), who produced five winners headed by Listed winner Zoowraa (Azamour) who is the dam of Harlech. Further back this is the family of Grade 3 winner Ribbon (Her Majesty) - the dam of Grade 1 winner Risen Star (Secretariat) and Listed-winning pair Woven Silk (Danzig) and Silk Braid (Danzig).

Harlech was covered by Yulong’s resident sire Alabama Express (Redoute’s Choice) in December. 

In winning Saturday’s Group 1, the filly becomes the third elite level winner bred on the Frankel / Pivotal (Polar Falcon) cross, joining now Darley-based stallion Cracksman and Veracious, while she becomes Pivotal’s 24th Group 1 winner as a broodmare sire. 

Yulong will offer the filly’s Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice) half-sister at next week’s Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale and she is catalogued as Lot 328. Fairgray said, that while their were similarities between the two fillies, her yearling sister looks slightly more furnished than Hungry Heart did at the same stage. 

“We have her half-sister by Snitzel at the sale and there are a lot of similarities between the two, but with the filly being by Snitzel probably has a little bit more strength to her,” said Fairgray.

“She has been popular and she is a lovely filly with a great head, great shoulder and lovely hindquarter. She will be even more popular now. Looking at them you would say that this filly would be slightly further forward than Hungry Heart at the same stage.”

Frankel - who covers a select book of mares on southern hemisphere time at Banstead Manor in Newmarket - has made an immediate impact in Australia, having 35 runners for 22 winners, with six of them being stakes winners, firing at a strike rate of winners to runners of an extraordinary 64.2 per cent. Hungry Heart joins Mirage Dancer as the stallion’s other Australian Group 1 winner. 

The son of Galileo (Sadler’s Wells) has five lots set to be offered at the Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale, with Yulong offering a colt and filly by the stallion. 

“The two Frankel's we have have been really popular,” said Fairgray. “The colt is a great moving colt and has been really well received. 

“The filly really reminds me of what Miss Finland was like as a yearling. She is very athletic and a very good mover. I think Frankel has really built momentum in the southern hemisphere, because he has had so many horses in Australia that have performed so well. 

“He’s a fantastic stallion and not many stallions have been able to do it in both hemispheres, but he seems to work here and in Europe.”