Deep Impact double as Japanese breeding reigns supreme

It never takes long to reach the name of Deep Impact when discussing Japanese racing and bloodstock and the nation's totemic sire was front and centre of its two latest international winners in Hong Kong.

Both Glory Vase, who mowed down a gutsy Pyledriver in the Longines Hong Kong Vase, and the admirably brave Cup winner Loves Only You are both offspring of the brilliant son of Sunday Silence.

Although he died in the middle of 2019, Deep Impact is set to become champion general sire for the tenth consecutive year, with the likes of Japan Cup hero Contrail keeping his name in lights.

Deep Impact did not race in Hong Kong himself but he made an impact at the International meeting in 2015 with the Cup victory of A Shin Hikari. Glory Vase had already run away with the Vase two years ago and had chased home Loves Only You in a Japanese clean sweep of the QEII Cup at Sha Tin in April.

Although Deep Impact is still waiting for a truly influential stallion son to emerge, the six-year-old entire Glory Vase is another eligible candidate.

He is the first foal out of winning Swept Overboard mare Mejiro Tsubone and a great-grandson of Mejiro Ramonu, Japan's first ever filly Triple Crown winner back in 1986. Both of Glory Vase's two younger siblings in Japan are winners and there is a Heart's Cry yearling colt, also bred by Lake Villa Farm, to come.

The paddocks certainly await Loves Only You, a priceless mare after her victories in not only the Japanese Oaks but last month's Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf. As she signed off her career at Sha Tin on Sunday by defeating her compatriot Hishi Iguazu by a short head, jockey Yuga Kawada announced fondly: "I hope she will be a good mother."

Loves Only You has now even surpassed the feats of her full-brother and now Shadai resident Real Steel, a winner of the Dubai Turf. They are both out of the remarkable Storm Cat mare Loves Only Me, who did not race for Aidan O'Brien but was bought for $900,000 by Northern Farm's Katsumi Yoshida at Keeneland in 2009.

Loves Only Me is a half-sister to Moyglare Stud Stakes and Prix Marcel Boussac winner Rumplestiltskin out of a sister to Kingmambo - the cherished Miesque line.

Loves Only You is a sister to another black-type performer, Prodigal Son, while the last in the sequence looks to be another Deep Impact colt, an unraced two-year-old named Dean's Lister, who is registered in training with her own handler, Yoshito Yahagi.

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