Latest chapter in storied Parkhill family will be written at Wetherby with debut of Mossy Fen Road
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Our resident bloodstock experts profile the well-bred eyecatchers and expensive purchases set to grace the track.
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What's the story?
An impressive debut four-year-old maiden winner on St Patrick's Day last year, Mossy Fen Road makes his rules debut for Harry Derham and is the latest member of one of the greatest current families in the National Hunt studbook to begin his track career.
Despite his illustrious heritage he was relatively inexpensive as a store, making €75,000 to Monbeg Stables at the Goffs Arkle Sale of 2023 where he was consigned by his breeder Castletown Quarry Stud.
How's he bred?
From the penultimate crop of the brilliant National Hunt sire Flemensfirth, the five-year-old gelding is a half-brother to Fury Road who was successful in the Grade 1 Neville Hotels Novice Chase at the Leopardstown Christmas Festival for Gordon Elliott and Gigginstown House Stud.
That son of Stowaway was an ever-present fixture in Grade 1 chases at around 3m and in that same season was runner-up to Ahoy Senor in the Mildmay Novices' Chase and third in Punchestown's Champion Novice Chase.
The following season he won a Grade 2 at Down Royal and was third to Conflated in the Savills Chase and filled the same position behind Galopin Des Champs in the Irish Gold Cup.
Fury Road was also a triple Graded winner over hurdles so the 11-year-old was a talented performer in his prime but it is the generational reach of his page that makes both him and Mossy Fen Road of such interest.
Their dam, the unraced Oscar mare Molly Duffy, has produced three winners from four runners on the track but is very closely related to Court Cave gelding City Island, who triumphed in the Grade 1 Neptune Investments' Novice Hurdle for the Fastorslow team of Martin Brassil and Sean and Bernadine Mulryan.
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They are also half-siblings to Pink Hat, a quadruple winner by Presenting and the dam of the Listed T A Morris Memorial Mares' Chase winner and Grade 1 Honeysuckle Mares' Novice Hurdle third Pink In The Park who was sold for €120,000 at the Goffs December National Hunt Sale last month.
The trio are out of Victorine, again unraced, but an Un Desperado half-sister to the Champion Hurdle-winning full-brothers Morley Street and Granville Again. Their half-sisters Deep Line and Markiza are the dams of Grade 1 winners Hand Inn Hand and Lovethehigherlaw, respectively.
With the exception of Pink In The Park who was bred by Jackie Mullins, every single one of the horses named from the pedigree was bred by the Parkhill family at their farm in County Meath, which is an extraordinary achievement.
Molly Duffy has a three-year-old son by Jet Away and a two-year-old Workforce filly. Last year she went to Jeu St Eloi, who was standing his first season in Ireland at Glenview Stud.
Who does he face?
Mossy Fen Road is one of three runners making their track debuts with six-year-old Garrantemple, trained by Donald McCain, fetching €27,000 at Goresbridge in late November having finished runner-up in a five-year-old maiden earlier that month.
Robin Pearson's homebred Whateverwilldo, a five-year-old son of Forever Now, has no racing experience whatsoever. In contrast He's A Diamond, Orderoftheday and Parish Quiz are each making their fourth starts when their bumper and point-to-point experiences are combined.
Olly Murphy trains Orderoftheday, from the first crop of Order Of St George, for Diana Whateley and the five-year-old was the most expensive of these to go through the sales ring. Murphy and his father, the bloodstock agent Aiden, went to £125,000 to secure the close relation of Listed-placed mare I'm All You Need at the Goffs Spring Sale last May.
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