Yulong’s new star Femminile bidding for famous Derby double
A near-perfect preparation – apart from the matter of spending Tuesday being sold at auction – has Femminile (Dundeel) well primed to again show up the boys as she attempts a Derby double on Saturday.
Rather unwanted as a yearling – her breeder had to stay in for 50 per cent and then Phillip Stokes had great trouble offloading his half – Femminile is an $8 third favourite as she attempts to follow her victory in the South Australian Derby (Gr 1, 2500m) on May 3 by claiming the Queensland Derby (Gr 1, 2400m).
It’s extremely rare for a filly to be a dual Derby winner, although the last was only in 2015 in the shape of star West Australian Delicacy (Al Maher). To be fair, while she beat an emerging Winx (Street Cry) to become Australia’s Champion 3YO Filly that season, Delicacy’s double was kicked off in Group 2 company in her home state’s lately diminished Derby, before she took the SA edition.
If Femminile can prevail on Saturday under Tim Clark, it will continue a female domination of the three-year-old scene, making it four of the mainland states’ five Derbies to fall to fillies.
Aeliana (Castelvecchio) streaked away with the Australian Derby (Gr 1, 2400m) – becoming the first filly to do so since Shamrocker (O’Reilly) in 2011 – while Machine Gun Gracie (Maschino) took the WA version, also last month.
Consider other star females in dual Oaks winner Treasurethe Moment (Alabama Express), plus shorter course stars in the unbeaten Autumn Glow (The Autumn Sun) and the five-from-seven Lady Shenandoah (Snitzel), and Australia’s three-year-old scene is looking like a poster for girl power.
Despite this, and the fact she beat him into second by 0.75 lengths in their last start in the SA Derby, Femminile is merely third favourite behind David and Emma-Lee Browne’s Statuario (D’Argento), who’s $5, for the Eagle Farm Classic.
Yet another filly – Chris Waller’s Belle Detelle (Zed) was second favourite on Friday at $5.50, after winning the Adrian Knox Stakes (Gr 3, 2000m), running fifth in the ATC Oaks (Gr 1, 2400m), and sixth in Doomben’s Rough Habit Plate (Gr 3, 2000m), making good ground from the back when beaten 2.99 lengths.
Still, Stokes is confident Femminile can defy the odds assessors, saying her preparation had been ultra smooth – except for one notable detour.
On Tuesday she completed trackwork at the Gold Coast, and then was taken to the Magic Millions sale yard. She spent half the day in her box, then was walked into the ring where she became the sixth-highest lot at the National Broodmare Sale, sold to Zhang Yuesheng’s Yulong for $1.5 million.
It was a neat ten times her yearling price two years ago at Inglis Easter, of $150,000. Or 20 times her actual price, considering breeder Simon Delzoppo had to stay in for half. Such can be the difficulties of moving fillies by Dundeel (High Chaparral), though Femminile in particular, and a support cast, are working wonders this season to change certain perceptions in that area.
Stokes was relieved to receive a phonecall from Yulong after the auction advising him to please carry on with Femminile’s Derby plans, and while a day at the sales four days out from the race hadn’t initially been among them, the trainer is pleased with her preparations, which could be aided further by rain.
“Everything’s gone pretty well,” Stokes told ANZ Bloodstock News. “The only hiccup was hanging in the sales complex all day.
“When we knew that was coming, we decided to stable at the Gold Coast rather than Eagle Farm at least to make things easier.
“She did a piece of work on Tuesday morning ridden by Ethan Brown, who was very happy with her, then later the staff took her over to the sale yard.
“We’d had a few inspections at the stables the day prior, and tried to keep it to a minimum. Then she had six or seven hours in her box at the sale yard.
“That wasn’t ideal, and she left a bit of feed the day after, but she seems to have picked up now. So, onwards and upwards.
“She’s the type of filly who takes things in her stride. You could see that when they went over to the sales complex, she just took it all in her stride. She’s got a great attitude which will take her a long way.”
That would jar with some people’s impressions of Dundeel’s reputedly fizzy fillies. While his sons have historically achieved more than his daughters – with 25 stakes winners to 12 overall – the girls have made great strides to catch up this season.
Seven of the Arrowfield’s $88,000 (inc GST) stallion’s ten stakes winners this term have been female, with Femminile his first female Group 1 winner – appropriate for a filly given an overtly feminine name in defiance of her sire’s past stats.
But more negative perceptions were still front and centre two years ago. It was only after some prolonged negotiations that Stokes and Rick Connolly Bloodstock agreed to buy her for, essentially, $75,000, and even then they had trouble syndicating their half.
Before this week taking on the Yulong green and white, she had raced in OTI’s navy and gold, but that was a struggle too.
“When I purchased her, we had to get rid of 50 per cent, and I thought, ‘I’m in trouble here’,” Stokes said.
“I rang [OTI boss] Terry Henderson and he said ‘Nope, not interested’, I think just because she was a Dundeel filly. Then he said, ‘Oh hang on, I’m driving past your farm tomorrow so I’ll take a look at her’.
“So he had a look, fell in love with her, changed his mind and said, ‘Yeah we’ll take half of your half’.
“And then he obviously had trouble syndicating her as well because he ended up getting stuck with 20 per cent of her himself. That’s turned out to be very good for him now – a nice thing to get stuck with.
“It’s good when it works out like it has. It usually doesn’t.
“Then this week she’s sold at a premium price. But if she comes out and wins the Derby, Mr Zhang will think he’s got her for half price.”
To that matter, Stokes is warm on his chances.
He’s won the Derby before with Mr Quickie (Shamus Award) in 2019, who had a similar preparation – except for the being auctioned off bit – having contested the SA Derby at his previous start, running third.
Mr Quickie flew to Brisbane three days before his Eagle Farm triumph. Femminile was floated to the Gold Coast a week ago and has worked clockwise since, having also had a right-handed workout at home at Pakenham, in a group session also involving Statuario, in fact.
The other factor buoying Stokes was the strong prediction for rain at Eagle Farm on Friday and Saturday, which was expected to send Friday’s soft 5 rating verging more towards heavy.
Femminile has had one soft outing for a 0.86-length third in Caulfield’s Ethereal Stakes (Gr 3, 2000m) on a soft 7. Her only race on worse going brought a 1.5-length victory on a heavy 9 in Morphettville’s Oaklands Plate (Listed, 1400m) at her second start a year ago.
“The rain will only help her, she runs the trip, so she ticks a lot of boxes,” Stokes said. “She’s been working well the reverse way, so I’m pretty happy.”
Stokes, who chose the Derby for Femminile over the Queensland Oaks (Gr 1, 2200m) because of its extra distance, was surprised by the bookmakers’ assessment.
At Morphettville, Femminile travelled behind Statuario before zipping to the lead on the fence on straightening. Statuario went wider, and while he was held up momentarily early in the straight, Femminile was holding him comfortably on the line.
“The bookies have him favourite, but I thought he had his chance to beat us in the Derby. And if we get a wet track it will only help us,” said Stokes, bemused by an apparently lingering bias towards males despite much evidence, particularly this season.
“History will tell us our best horses in the last 15 years have all been mares. Fillies certainly seem to be dominating this season. Plus, they get a two-kilo weight advantage in these races that helps them.”
Furthermore, Statuario’s only experience on rain-affected ground was his second-start eighth in a Sale maiden. While that was over an unsuitable 1100m, Emma-Lee Browne has been left hopeful, rather than confident, he can absorb whatever Eagle Farm throws up on Saturday.
“He’s probably better on top of the ground,” she told ANZ. “However, mentally and strength-wise, he’s got a lot better from other times we’ve tried him on wet.
“So we’re hoping that with him being hard fit now, and the fact he’s come on a long way with his racing, that hopefully it’ll get him through a lot better.”
Statuario is not only stabled with Femminile at the Gold Coast, he’s also having his first start since the SA Derby four weeks ago. On top of that, his previous run was a month before that, with a 2400m win at Caulfield.
Browne isn’t perturbed by this relative sparsity of races.
“I’d rather that than if he’d had races in between. He’s still got fairly fresh legs with the spaces between his runs,” said Browne, adding she’d been delighted with the gelding’s SA Derby run.
“It was one of those things. We went out wider, struck a bit of trouble. Femminile ran super. She got that inside run and we had to cover a bit more ground, and we got blocked for a little bit in the straight and lost a little bit of momentum, but our boy ran super.
“I’m as confident as you can be. We’re very happy with him, but it’s a tough field and you need everything to go right. Hopefully the bookies are right.”