Ex-Channel 4 Racing boss on 'up and down fortune of owning and breeding horses'

Anyone who has had anything to do with horses knows how fleeting life can be, and would be familiar with the ultra thin line between triumph and disaster - John Fairley is experienced enough in the game to know when to celebrate the ups.

The former Channel 4 Racing maestro has had to endure plenty of heartbreak along the way to Highfield Princess' career-best effort to win the 1895 Duke of York Stakes, and in powering to a near three-length win at York the five-year-old was providing her owner-breeder with ample and deserved compensation.

Having risen through handicaps as a three-year-old, culminating in Royal Ascot victory in the Buckingham Palace Stakes, Highfield Princess then immediately gained a first black-type success in the Queen Charlotte Fillies' Stakes at Chelmsford the following month.

Group placings in the Oak Tree Stakes and City of York came next, and Highfield Princess has continued a high standard of form, to the extent the John Quinn-trained mare is again on the royal meeting trail.

Highfield Princess has also been paying glowing tribute to her dam Pure Illusion, a Danehill mare who was picked up in utero to the daughter of Night Of Thunder by Fairley's Trainers House Enterprises from Godolphin at the Tattersalls December Mare Sale in 2016.

The story behind Highfield Princess began in France with the winning mare Torrealta and her date with Le Havre, though the end result of that was great sadness.

Pure Illusion: dam of Highfield Princess was picked up by John Fairley from Godolphin in 2016Credit: Mark Cranham (racingpost.com/photos)

Fairley says: "I'd had a few horses in France and the best one was called Torrealta and she went to Le Havre when he was quite a bit cheaper.

"I brought her home from France, she was doing well and was about four or five months pregnant, when one day she was limping in from the field and came in and just collapsed and died with the foal overnight.

"It was really part-consolation to myself that I went to the sales in Newmarket, and Pure Illusion was one of the very last lots and was in foal to Night Of Thunder.

"I'd hardly bought her when Cardsharp started winning all over the place for Mark Johnston. It's the up and down fortune of owning and breeding horses that was the background to Highfield Princess."

Cardsharp, Pure Illusion's colt by Lonhro, proved one of the best juveniles around the year after Fairley had acquired his dam, winning the Woodcote and Group 2 July Stakes, and finishing third in the Norfolk, Richmond, Gimcrack and Middle Park Stakes.

With a two-year-old colt by National Stud resident Aclaim in training with Quinn called Highfield Viking, there could be more chapters to come in this story, although tragically Pure Illusion died before being covered for a second time by Aclaim, sire of this season's 1,000 Guineas heroine Cachet.

Malton-based Fairley, who is Quinn's landlord, says: "We decided to go to Aclaim with Pure Illusion and we've got the two-year-old and he lives just a couple of boxes down from his sister.

"But then, with all the ups and downs, Pure Illusion was at the National Stud to be covered by Aclaim a second time and she just keeled over and died.

John Fairley (second right): 'I've suddenly been terribly lucky'Credit: John Grossick (racingpost.com/photos)

"I've suddenly been terribly lucky on the track, and we like the two-year-old - John Quinn says he's a nice horse - so it's the ups and downs of this wonderful business isn't it?"

There should be more big prizes to be won with Highfield Princess, who posted a career-high Racing Post Rating of 117 with her Knavesmire romp at the Dante meeting.

She is set to be tested for only the second time in Group 1 company at Royal Ascot, in the Platinum Jubilee Stakes, while she is also entered in the Darley July Cup and could be on her travels.

Fairley says: "She didn't run as a two-year-old and it was only well into her three-year-old season that she really started running and winning. She's five now and we still think she's progressing, so at the moment we're going to race her for the rest of this year.

"As she's French-bred she'll probably race a few times in France and our intention at the moment, if all went well, would be to keep her and breed from her next year.

"She's getting stronger and stronger and has a wonderful mind, she just pulls out more and more, so the conclusion is we'd want to keep and breed from her but with a bit of luck she'll race quite a bit.

"She's entered in the Platinum Jubilee Stakes and then we'll probably try to go to the Prix Maurice de Gheest."

As for future mating plans, Fairley, who was chairman of Highflyer, which produced Channel 4 Racing for many years until replaced by IMG,is not nailing his red and yellow colours to any particular mast.

He is keen to explore all options for his beloved mare, while rightly feeling she is deserving of a top stallion.

"It's probably too early to say but I love the idea of a foal share in a really good stallion, something like Frankel, so that might be a route we would go down," he says.

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