First foal for star-crossed superstar Roaring Lion is a well-bred colt

The first foal from the only crop of ill-fated champion Roaring Lion has been born at Jeffrey and Pheobe Hobby's Brightwalton Stud in Berkshire.

The new arrival, born on Saturday evening, is a colt out of the six-year-old Azamour mare Counterweight.

Brightwalton Stud manager Sean Keane said: “He's a well-made, attractive colt with plenty of athleticism. He's full of energy and is a joy to be around. The Hobbys are delighted with him.”

Counterweight was bred and raced by the famed Ballymacoll Stud and was bought by Brightwalton Stud for 90,000gns when the operation dispersed its stock at the Tattersalls December Breeding-Stock Sale in 2017.

Read more: Here's hoping the sole crop of Roaring Lion foals do their father proud

The dam, who finished second once in a light career, is a sister to Blandford Stakes winner Eleanora Duse and half-sister to Irish Oaks runner-up Scottish Stage and is descended from Ballymacoll's great mare Sun Princess, successful in the Oaks and St Leger and second to All Along in the Arc.

Counterweight's first foal, a Sea The Stars filly foal, sold to Springfield Bloodstock for 310,000gns at Tattersalls in November.

Roaring Lion covered a glittering book of 133 mares at Tweenhills at a fee of £40,000 last year including Group/Grade 1 winners Bateel, Giofra, Golden Lilac, Lightening Pearl, Molly Malone, Seal Of Approval, Shonan Adela and Simple Verse, as well as the dams of celebrities Dolniya, Kitten's Dumplings, Marmelo and Poet's Word.

The strong demand for his services was fuelled by the Qatar Racing-owned son of Kitten's Joy having won the Dante Stakes, Coral-Eclipse, Juddmonte International, Irish Champion Stakes and Queen Elizabeth II Stakes, efforts which made him the highest rated three-year-old anywhere in the world in 2018.

However, disaster struck last August when he succumbed to colic shortly after arriving at Cambridge Stud in New Zealand for shuttling duty.

Australian sire sensation Zoustar, who served his debut northern hemisphere book of mares alongside Roaring Lion at Tweenhills in 2019, also has his first foal on the ground.

The filly, born at Peter Winkworth’s Merton Place Stud in Surrey last week, is the first live foal out of the winning Excelebration mare Coral Sea.

Winkworth said: “I’m a big fan of Zoustar and his first foal born in Britain is a cracker – well conformed, close coupled and perky.

“[Tweenhills owner] David Redvers actually bought her granddam Tropical Paradise for us as a yearling, so it’s great it’s come full circle.”

There are 125 more mares carrying foals by Zoustar following his first spell at Tweenhills and the son of Northern Meteor is expected to be busy again in 2020.

The first sire to be champion first-season, second-season and three-year-old sire in Australia since Danehill, he had yearlings sell at Magic Millions last week for A$900,000, A$600,000, A$580,000, A$500,000 (twice), and so on.

Zoustar's fee for the forthcoming breeding season has been set at £30,000.

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