Regal relations on the first steps to glory at Galway

In recent years the likes of subsequent Group 1 winners Hermosa and Legatissimo have won the 7f two-year-old fillies' maiden that takes place at Galway on Tuesday evening; indeed, the race has a rich history of producing winners who go on to showcase their talents on the biggest stages.

That traces all the way back to 1995, when Dance Design made a winning debut at Galway for the master of Ballybrit, Dermot Weld, and owner-breeder Moyglare Stud. Fast forward 12 months and Dance Design was in the winner's enclosure after her triumph in the Irish Oaks.

Neither Legatissimo nor Hermosa hinted at what was to come when making their debuts as juveniles, but both put their experiences to good use when winning at Ballybrit, which could be a pointer to the chances of Dower House in the Colm Quinn BMW Irish EBF Fillies' Maiden (6.10).

Aidan O'Brien's impeccably bred Galileo filly was sixth on her debut in a similar contest at the Curragh on Irish Derby weekend, and the winner of that race was last Thursday's Group 3 Silver Flash Stakes winner Never Ending Story.

Legatissimo also made her debut in a 7f maiden at the Irish Derby meeting, the subsequent Classic heroine then going on to win at Ballybrit.

Dower House is a sister to none other than European champion two-year-old, 2,000 Guineas and Irish 2,000 Guineas winner Churchill and Cheveley Park Stakes winner Clemmie. Continuing the Churchillian naming theme is her Group 3 Diamond Stakes-winning brother Blenheim Palace.

They are out of Meow, who won the Listed Grangecon Stud Stakes and was second in the Queen Mary. A daughter of Storm Cat and Henry Candy's Cheveley Park Stakes heroine Airwave, Meow is a half-sister to the Group 3 winner Aloof and the Listed winners Orator and Keats, all by Dower House's sire Galileo.

For once though, it is not the Coolmore filly with the regal relations who will bear the brunt of high expectations in the race.

It is Dermot Weld's debutante Tahiyra who will have many a gaze fixed upon her bay frame. The Aga Khan's homebred daughter of Siyouni is a half-sister to one of the best racemares of the last ten years in Tarnawa.

That Shamardal mare was third to Hermosa in this race when making her debut in 2018, and went on to string a sequence of Group 1 successes together in 2020, winning the Prix Vermeille and Prix de l'Opera before claiming the Breeders' Cup Turf crown.

Last season she was an unlucky second to St Mark's Basilica in the Irish Champion Stakes and was thwarted by the late lunge of Torquator Tasso in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.

Tarnawa and Tahiyra are out of a Galway winner in Tarana, whose victory in the Listed Oyster Stakes at the track was one of a brace of Listed wins. Tarana is a Cape Cross daughter of Tarakala, successful in the Listed Galtres Stakes, and the Dr Fong mare is a daughter of Tarakana, who was runner-up in the Oyster Stakes - so Galway clearly suits the family.

Tahiyra is bred on the same Siyouni-Cape Cross lines as another champion filly in Laurens.

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