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posted on 30 May, 2021

Japanese Derby number seven to son of Deep Impact

The phenomenal late Deep Impact once again reminded the global breeding industry of his loss when siring the winner of the Japanese Derby, the Tokyo Yushun, for the fourth straight year on Sunday. It was his seventh overall. 

Trained by Hideaki Fujiwara, Shahryar showed a real turn of foot to repel favourite and 2,000 Guineas hero Efforia by a nose in the last 100 metres.

For Shahryar, this was first top-level success on just his fourth career start. It was a race-record time of 2 minutes, 22.5 seconds, topping the previous mark by 0.1 seconds in the 2,400-meter race.

Winning rider Yuichi Fukunaga said: “It’s great to have won the Derby, which I had made the target with this colt since his debut.

"We were keeping an eye on the favourite but the race didn’t go as smoothly as planned and we were in a tight spot so we were forced to make our charge late, but this colt gave a terrific effort."

The winner of the Grade 3 Mainichi Hai in March, the colt is out of the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint heroine Dubai Majesty, a daughter of multiple American Graded scorer Essence Of Dubai, and is a full-brother to Al Ain, winner of the Japanese 2,000 Guineas and Osaka Hai and Yasutoshi Ikee.

Owned by Sunday Racing and bred by Northern Farm, Shahryar was following in the footsteps of Contrail, Roger Barows, Wagnerian and Makahiki in providing his late supersire with a win in the Japanese Classic. 

The three-year-old was leading home a 1-3-4-5 in the race for Deep Impact, who died at the age of 17 in 2019 due to a fracture of the cervical spine.

Novara Park’s Staphanos present an outstanding opportunity to the New Zealand breeder as a multiple Group One performed son of Deep Impact.

Image- Staphanos by Deep Impact

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