Ascot hero Rashabar proving a Czech mate for Haras de Beaufay

The name of Haras de Beaufay, which bred its first ever Group winner in regal style through Rashabar in last month's Coventry Stakes, conjures up visions of timbered manor houses and dreamy French countryside.

That’s all there in physical form at the village of Le Sap-Andre in southern Normandy but its soul is from somewhere else entirely, across the continent in the Czech Republic.

Beaufay is owned by Jiri Travnicek, who made his fortune by establishing and then selling a major company manufacturing non-woven textiles for industries such as healthcare. Travnicek has been involved in racing at home since the 1980s but his Gallic outpost is a much more recent venture. Rashabar, who was bought by Sam Sangster for €120,000 at last year’s Arqana August Yearling Sale, was one of the first horses it had consigned to an auction.

Travnicek’s daughter, Barbora Vemolova, oversees the operation.

"It isn’t a long time ago," she says. "We bought the farm in 2016 and it took some time to renovate everything, we couldn’t use the facilities that were here. 

"We had to rebuild everything and brought the first horses to the farm only in about autumn 2018. We started with just our own horses for the first season, before we got some clients from the Czech Republic, France, Germany."

Barbora Vemolova and Jiri TravnicekCredit: Scott Burton

It was not the intention that Rashabar’s dam, Amazonka, would be such a pioneering resident at the stud. The Camelot half-sister to the recent Listed Pontefract Castle Stakes winner River Of Stars was herself bought for €70,000 from the same yearling sale in 2019.

"We were planning to race her but unfortunately she had an injury in a paddock before she really even started in training," explains Vemolova.

"It was just a stupid accident, she hurt her leg and couldn’t be trained any more. We took her to my dad’s home farm to recover, then we sent her to Beaufay for breeding.

"It was a pity but, on the other hand, we could keep her for breeding from a young age. We were very hopeful about her as a horse, we did want to race her, but at the end of the day it’s maybe turned out even better."

Rashabar, by Holy Roman Emperor, was her first foal at a liminal stage in Beaufay’s development.

"He was very nice as a yearling and at the time that [the price] was okay," says Vemolova. "We were just beginners at Arqana. Before that we had some broodmares with pedigrees that weren’t good enough for the sale.

"Right now, we have around 15 mares of our own. It’s half-and-half, we have some we keep for the sales and there are some different mares breeding horses to keep for ourselves to race in the Czech Republic. We have a private racing stable, which has maybe 25 or 30 horses of our own in training.

"We were thinking we had to do something about the pedigrees. This was a reason we bought Amazonka. We wanted to train her but knew we wanted to breed from her afterwards."

Rashabar was still a maiden, albeit a well regarded one by Brian Meehan and Manton Thoroughbreds, when he appeared on the first day of Royal Ascot and had caught the eye in two previous starts at Newbury and Chester. 

Sent off at 80-1 under teenage sensation Billy Loughnane, he burned off the rest of his companions on the far side of the track and held on in isolation, by a neck from Electrolyte.

"We’d been watching him since his first run," says Vemolova. "We were wondering if it was too much for him before the race, but it was incredible. We were also thinking about the distance [six furlongs], whether it could be a bit short for him from the point of view of his breeding, but it was just okay."

The result had immediate implications for Amazonka’s subsequent foal, a filly by Acclamation, who is engaged as lot 52 at Arqana’s showpiece sale next month.

Vemolova, who regularly visits the stud along with her father, has been in close touch with a Beaufay team headed by Pauline Houllier about this valuable prospect and dropped in again during the week of the Summer Sale.

"She’s doing fine," she says. "She’s a bit different, obviously she’s a filly not a colt. She’s in preparation for the sale and there’s a month and a half to go. She looks good right now but she’ll look great by the time of the sale.

"Amazonka has a colt foal by St Mark’s Basilica who has just arrived from Ireland. He’s just beautiful, I think he's the best we’ve had this year and we’ll hope for next year. We tried to cover her with Kodiac but it wasn’t successful. We switched to St Mark’s Basilica again and she’s in foal."

Rashabar pictured before his sale to Britain at Haras de BeaufayCredit: Eva Kopecna

Travnicek, who hails from South Moravia in the eastern corner of the country, has been interested in racing and breeding since before the fall of communism and the dissolution of the old Czechoslovakia. He was once part of a stud co-operative which even imported the three-time Bay Meadows Handicap winner Super Moment.

Habitually seen in a trilby, the businessman is still a supporter of his homeland’s traditional steeplechasing pursuits. Belovodsk, who finished fifth in a cross-country race at Cheltenham in 2001, was a regular in the Velka Pardubicka only to be superseded in the Czech Republic’s showpiece race by French-bred recruit Orphee Des Blins, who won it three consecutive times between 2012 and 2014.

"This year it’s just so happened we’ve had more than half our foals for jumping," says his daughter. "Orphee Des Blins retired and stays at my dad’s farm but we’ve got one horse for the Velka Pardubicka again.

"Godfrey fell at the famous jump, the Taxis, there was a big collision with many horses, but he has won a qualification for the race again this year."

Beaufay has raced the odd horse in France and intends to again, although runners are often brought by road across Europe. Its private trainer Dalibor Torok, who spent time with Michael Bell and rode the Derby winner Motivator in work, has had some success through the stayer Vert Liberte, with the consistent Muhaarar gelding finishing third in the Group 3 Prix Gladiateur last autumn. Queen Of Beaufay, one of the very first homebreds and a filly from the debut crop of Zarak, won the Czech Derby in 2022.

Although domestic racing is still part of the culture, it remains a pastime rather than big business.

Vemolova says: "It’s been the same for the last 20 years. We don’t have a strong betting system putting money back into races, and it has to find a lot of money to have more meetings. There are a lot of trainers with a small number of horses. It’s very different to France, or England, but it is how it is."

Certainly the family deserve praise for enterprise and their attempt to switch from being a big fish in a small pond to quite the opposite. 

"It’s always a long process," says Vemolova. "Sometimes you don’t have much luck. We had some good mares but one had colic, another one died in foaling. 

"Luckily, Amazonka is a great mum, a very kind horse with people too. She was a favourite from the beginning and it’s always nice to have horses like that in the stable."

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