The bargain-hunting breeders who bought Ace Impact's only sister for €10,000

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Here he speaks to the shrewd Marie Illegems about Ace Impact's half-sister – subscribers can get more great insight from Martin every Monday to Friday.

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Adlon Rose, a six-year-old daughter of Nathaniel, might have won only once from 14 starts – in a minor middle-distance contest at Machecoul in western France, at that – and she might have been sold for a mere €10,000 at the end of her racing career, but her value has skyrocketed this season.

The reason she is now worth many multiples of that price, which she realised at the Arqana December Breeding Stock Sale two years ago, is that she is the only female sibling of Sunday’s impressive Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe winner Ace Impact among the seven foals produced by their dam, the Listed-placed Anabaa Blue mare Absolutly Me.

Marie Illegems, who established her Haras des Embruns near Nantes in 2009, is the woman who bought Adlon Rose for a song. The accomplished horsewoman, who has no doubt fielded 1,001 calls from Flat breeders and agents about the valuable commodity gracing her paddocks, might hitherto have been best known in Britain and Ireland for breeding the high-class jumpers Punch Nantais and Zarkareva.

“I trained as a pharmacist in my previous life, but horses were always my true passion,” says Illegems. “I rode show jumping horses during my studies, but it was racing that really fascinated me.

“After graduation I chose to work with racehorses instead of being a pharmacist, and I had the chance to spend a year at Alain de Royer-Dupré learning the ropes as his assistant. I always intended to get into breeding eventually, but first I wanted to understand a great trainer's approach to horses.

“Haras des Embruns is 40 hectares in western France. I breed horses for my clients and myself, and I also prepare and consign yearlings to the sales. I have around 15 to 20 mares, half owned by clients outright and the other half owned in partnership by my husband, myself and my clients – most of whom have become good friends over the years.”

Ace Impact after storming to Arc gloryCredit: Edward Whitaker

So how did Adlon Rose come onto her radar at Deauville in December 2021?

“I usually buy two or three mares at the sales, or out of claiming races, each year and syndicate them in three or four shares,” says Illegems. “Doing it that way, you split the risk and share the success.

“I particularly like buying young fillies or mares not just with good pedigrees, but also with active families. We put a lot of time and hard work into studying all the breeding-stock catalogues and following claiming races, and we always buy the horses for small prices.

“Then we breed from them and sell the progeny either as foals or as yearlings, and sometimes the mares themselves, depending on how the opportunities present themselves.”

Among Haras des Embruns’ recent sales-ring successes have been Lady Osborne, an unraced Fastnet Rock full-sister to Listed winner Naughty Or Nice bought for €7,000 from the Goffs November Sale in 2018 and sold in foal to Zarak for €110,000 at last year’s Arqana December Sale, where her Sottsass colt foal also made €105,000; and Waldfee, a Dansili half-sister to the smart Urwald from the family of Waldgeist bought for €24,000 at Arqana in December 2017 and flipped at the same venue 12 months later for €100,000.

It’s easy to see why the well bred Adlon Rose, not yet a sibling to an unbeaten Prix du Jockey Club and Arc winner but still a half-sister to Listed-placed Apollo Flight and from the family of elite winners Ibn Bey and Roseate Tern, fitted the bill for Illegems.

“My husband first spotted her in a claimer in April 2021, when her claiming price was €22,000,” she says. “We thought that was a little too much money, so we followed her for the rest of the season but she never raced in another claimer.

Adlon Rose: a winner from 14 starts but significantly a half-sister to the brilliant Arc hero Ace Impact

“We came across her again when she was catalogued for that year’s Arqana December sale, and we were really interested in her. She ticked all the boxes: she was a winner, she was by a good sire out of a black-type mare who was by a good damsire, and she was a sister to a black-type runner.

“We also liked that her Australia half-brother Alessandro was in training with Jean-Claude Rouget, and that he had bought her Cracksman yearling half-brother that year too.

“Alessandro had won in good style just before the sale and so we thought we wouldn't be able to buy her, but as it turned out we were the only bidders against the seller and we got her for €10,000.”

But did Illegems have to compromise on physique or temperament in order to get hold of that very relevant and recently updated page? 

“No, she’s perfect!” she exclaims. “Okay, I know I’m not exactly objective but seriously, she’s tall and elegant with a beautiful head and soft eyes. She’s a very nice mare with good manners, and she’s been a delight to manage and easy to get in foal.”

Illegems had a first date in mind for Adlon Rose from the moment she saw her in the Arqana catalogue. 

She says: “We had actually already had the idea of sending her to Zelzal before we bought her, as he’d been trained by Rouget, like her young siblings. So we sent her to that stallion in 2022 and in February this year she produced a filly by him who will now go to the Arqana December sale.”

The breeder also had a touch of inspiration when it came to Adlon Rose's second mating. The mare is now in foal to Ace Impact’s sire Cracksman. Illegems plays down any suggestions of genius, though.

“We had originally planned on sending her to Mishriff but unfortunately in the middle of March we learned that he probably wasn't going to be able to cover at all this year,” she says. “So we had to change our plans, but we didn’t have any other interesting ideas in France.

Cracksman: Adlon Rose visited Darley's young sire before Ace Impact's fameCredit: Edward Whitaker

“We always loved Cracksman, though. He was a little too expensive for us at the beginning, but we saw that his first crop was quite promising at two last year and his first few three-year-old runners were confirming that impression, so we decided to send Adlon Rose to him in Newmarket. That was before we knew Ace Impact was a crack; he had only just won his first race before she got on the ferry.”

Unsurprisingly, considering Illegems and her investors managed to find Adlon Rose at the bottom of the market, and have enjoyed so much success pinhooking in the past, the mare carrying a close relation to an Arc winner also has a date with the auctioneer at Arqana in December.

“We’ve discussed it with our associates and have chosen to sell her at Deauville this year,” says Illegems. “Don’t worry, though, we’ll also be trying to find the next sister to an Arc winner there!”

Fingers crossed Ace Impact and Adlon Rose’s German breeder Waltraut Spanner also ends up with a sister to an Arc winner, by breeding a second filly out of Absolutly Me.

She has the mare’s two-year-old colt by Gleneagles, named Arrow Eagle, in training with Rouget and her colt foal by Waldgeist. She sent her to another of Rouget's great champions, Almanzor, this year. 

The result of that mating would be some breeding prospect if she happened to be female.

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