By Sid Fernando
Juddmonte’s Frankel continued his ascent to the stars Saturday in the G1 Dewhurst at Newmarket, and the general commentary from Europe is that he’s the best 2-year-old seen on the continent in the last 20 years. Frankel is by Galileo out of Kind, by Danehill, and his pedigree combines the best of the Coolmore sires in this cross, as Galileo is a son of Sadler’s Wells and along with Montjeu is his sire’s best son at stud. The Sadler’s Wells branch of Northern Dancer is the epitome of classic royalty at 12 furlongs, while the Danehill branch of Northern Dancer, through Danzig, symbolizes the speed wing. On paper, then, this pedigree would appear to be that of a 10-furlong horse, but Frankel’s trainer, Henry Cecil, felt he was a miler before the Dewhurst, and that opinion doesn’t appear to have changed, despite Juddmonte racing manager Teddy Grimthorpe’s assertions that the Derby will be looked into as well depending on how the brilliant colt winters. At present, the target is the Guineas at Newmarket.
Juddmonte, of course, bred and raced Danehill before he was sold to stand at Coolmore and Arrowfield, and Frankel’s female family is a Juddmonte-crafted pedigree, with the next dam, Rainbow Lake, a daughter of Juddmonte’s Rainbow Quest. Several members of the family were trained for Juddmonte owner Khalid Abdullah by the late Jeremy Tree at Beckhampton, including Danehill. At the time, Roger Charlton was the assistant to Tree, and in 1990 Charlton took over the yard and trained Quest for Fame to an Epsom Derby win and Sanglamore to the French equivalent for Mr. Abdullah.
Roger Charlton also happens to be one of the few trainers around the world who has a blog and a presence on Twitter, and today he posted on his blog an inside look at the racing character of Kind, Frankel’s dam, as well as a look back at seven generations of Frankel’s tail-female descent. I highly recommend it because it confirms Henry Cecil’s current belief that the colt is a miler. Note that Cecil runs the colt with a Figure-8 noseband because he tends to pull, and he obviously is a speedy sort like his dam, who also was difficult to relax. See the excerpt below from Charlton’s post:
Her next foal was Frankel’s dam Kind and she is by Danehill (Jeremy Tree) and broke her maiden by 6 lengths over 7f and went on to win another 5 races, including two listed races one over 5f and the other over 6f. I tried hard to get her to relax but she became increasingly head strong. “
Click here to read the Charlton blog post in its entirety.
Click here to read about the three main contenders in the Dewhurst.
Click here to read an analysis of the Dewhurst by James Knight.