Group 1 double on Arc day for broodmare sire Sea The Stars as Makarova ends career on the perfect note

Brightwalton Bloodstock's homebred Acclamation filly Makarova ended her career in the perfect style, signing off with victory in the Group 1 Prix de l'Abbaye.

She is the seventh individual top-level winner by Rathbarry Stud's stalwart Acclamation and was completing a Group 1 double on the card as broodmare sire for Sea The Stars, the Arc hero of 2009. She is the seventh top-level winner in that role for the Aga Khan Studs' champion who was also filled that role in the pedigree of Vertical Blue, successful earlier in the day in the Prix Marcel Boussac. 

Vertical Blue is a daughter of Acclamation's leading sire son Mehmas.

Trainer Ed Walker was overjoyed with the success of Makarova and paid tribute to her owner-breeders Jeffrey and Phoebe Hobby, who own Brightwalton Stud outside Newbury in Berkshire.

"I'm a bit choked to be honest," Walker told Sky Sports Racing. "It's the last run of her career and Jeff and Phoebe have been amazing. It's pretty special.

"It was a career best last time and the rain came at the right time. She has been such fun over the years; she was hopeless at two, she was rated 76 and looked slow and I was running her over seven furlongs but she's just got better and better."

He added: "I'm so please for Jeff and Phoebe, they put a lot into the game. They are small owner-breeders and they do a great job. It's great when the little man gets a big day."

Five-year-old Makarova had been third in the Group 1 Flying Five at the Curragh last month and sixth in the Abbaye last year. She was winning for the fifth time in her career.

A half-sister to Group 3 Prix Eclipse second Nina Bailarina, by Lope De Vega, she is the third foal out of Vesnina, who was bred by Cheveley Park Stud and bought by Stroud Coleman on behalf of Brightwalton Bloodstock for 68,000gns at the Tattersalls July Sale of 2015.

She is the second Cheveley Park Stud bred mare to have produced a Group 1 winner at Longchamp on Sunday. Entreat, by Pivotal, is the dam of Camille Pissaro, successful in the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere, and she was sold by the Newmarket farm 12 months after Vesnina.

Successful at two and fourth in the Group 3 Dick Poole Stakes, Vesnina is a half-sister to Group 3 Fred Darling Stakes winner Marenko, by Exceed And Excel, and to the Invincible Spirit filly Potapova, also a Group 3 winner courtesy of her success in the Atalanta Stakes.

They are out of the Listed-placed Safina, a daughter of Pivotal and the brilliant Russian Rhythm, victorious in the 1,000 Guineas, Lockinge, Coronation and Nassau Stakes for Cheveley Park Stud and Sir Michael Stoute.

Russian Rhythm's unraced daughter Zykina, a full-sister to Safina, is the dam of last year's Group 1 Prix Jean Prat winner Good Guess, a son of Kodiac who retired to stand alongside his sire at Tally-Ho Stud.

Vesnina has a yearling filly by Cracksman and her foal this year is a daughter of Night Of Thunder. She was covered by Havana Grey in 2024.

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