SHOWCASING x BEE QUEEN I 16.1 1/2 hh I €6,000 Stands & Nurses
I Presentation
Belbek, a son of Showcasing from Bee Queen, by Makfi, is one of three newcomers, along with Mishriff and Angel Bleu, for 2024 to Nurlan Bizakov’s French stud Sumbe. All are Group 1 winners, but Belbek is a Sumbe homebred, and he’s also Nurlan Bizakov’s first winner at the highest level, which makes him the pride of place. As the top-rated French juvenile colt of 2022, he’s also a highly desirable prospect for French breeders. With his race record and pedigree, he’ll get early runners with speed that will stay 1600m and perhaps farther, depending on the mares he covers.
Like Angel Bleu, Belbek won the important sire-making G1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere over 1400m at Longchamp at two, which has graduated such important recent stallions as Siyouni and Wootton Bassett and past standouts including Blushing Groom and Irish River; and like Mishriff and Sumbe’s late leading sire Le Havre, he’s from the immediate family of proven stallions, in his case Dansili, Cacique, Champs Elysees – all by Danehill – and the Blushing Groom-line Leroidesanimaux, the sire of G1 Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom.
I Juddmonte pedigree
Under his Hesmonds Stud banner, Nurlan Bizakov purchased Belbek’s dam at Tattersalls in 2017 to get into this highly influential family that traces back in tail-female to Juddmonte’s foundation mare Sookera, a 2-year-old Group 1 winner by Roberto.
Juddmonte bred every mare in this female line from Belbek’s dam to Sookera’s High Line daughter Kerali – Belbek’s fifth dam.
Belbek’s fourth dam is the remarkable Kahyasi mare Hasili , a stakes winner who produced an astonishing five Group 1 winners: the previously mentioned Champs Elysees and Cacique, along with Heat Haze, by Green Desert ; Intercontinental, by Danehill; and champion Banks Hill , also by Danehill. Additionally, she produced the Group 2 winner and excellent Juddmonte sire Dansili and the Group 3 winner Deluxe, by Storm Cat.
Belbek’s third dam is aforementioned Banks Hill, whose progeny include G1 Prix Jean Romanet winner Romantica, by Galileo.
Belbek’s second dam is the Empire Maker mare Trojan Queen, who in addition to producing Belbek’s dam got the Kingman Group 3 winner Sangarius.
It’s immediately evident that the sires that have succeeded the most with this family are from the Danzig branches of Danehill and Green Desert, so the decision by the Sumbe team to send Bee Queen to Showcasing, a son of the Green Desert horse Oasis Dream, was inspired.
Not only that, in Showcasing, who stood for €45,000 in 2023, the Sumbe team went to a stallion that was also bred by Juddmonte, thereby doubling up on Juddmonte blood top and bottom.
Juddmonte-breds have become important stallions the world over, and there are too many successes to list here. Suffice to say, the Danzig horse Danehill was a breed shaper from the past, and Frankel, by Galileo, and Kingman, by Invincible Spirit, are well on their way to influencing the breed at present.
Oasis Dream, the sire of Showcasing, is another impactful Juddmonte-bred, and he is closely related to Kingman. Both are Green Desert-line stallions from the same family.
Oasis Dream was a champion 2-year-old and champion sprinter at three. He won the G1 Middle Park in his first year of racing and followed up the next season with scores in the G1 July Cup and G1 Nunthorpe Stakes, the latter over the minimum trip of 1000m. At stud, he has been a reliable conduit of top early maturing 2-year-olds and high-quality sprinters.
Oasis Dream stands at Juddmonte and has sired 135 black-type winners. Juddmonte has advertised him as “Europe’s leading source of Group 1 speed” for good reason: From his 66 Group winners, 18 are Group 1 winners and include such as Prix Morny winner Arcano, Middle Park winner Charming Thought, King’s Stand winner Golddream, Nunthorpe winner Jwala, and Commonwealth winner Muhaarar, among others, and they paint the picture vividly.
Some can get the mile in top company, as G1 Dewhurst winner Native Trail did when landing the G1 Irish 2000 Guineas, and, before him, Power in the same race. Midday, from a Kingmambo mare, stayed the 2400m of the G1 Prix Vermeille over soft ground, but she and a handful of others are the exceptions that prove that the norm for this line is speed.
Oasis Dream is by the Danzig sprinter Green Desert, also the sire of Invincible Spirit and Cape Cross, the sire of Sea the Stars and Golden Horn.
While Kingman and particularly Sea the Stars have broadened the distance scope of the line and can (see Kingman) and do (see Sea the Stars) regularly get top-class middle-distance horses, the Oasis Dream branch of Green Desert has been reliably speed oriented, and Belbek, despite hailing from a family with plenty of stamina, is proof of this.
Like Belbek, his sire Showcasing was an early developing colt who was best at two, winning the G2 Gimcrack Stakes and placing in the G1 Middle Park Stakes. At stud, he has sired 66 stakes winners, including 34 Group winners, four of them at the highest level, and his metier is early maturity and speed up to a mile. Two of his Group 1 winners, Advertise and Quiet Reflection, won the prestigious G1 Commonwealth Cup sprint at Ascot over 1200m.
Speed is an essential building block for any pedigree, and Belbek’s sire line has made its reputation on just that.
I Analysis
Belbek is actually 3x4 to Green Desert and has three strains of Danzig (4x5x5) within his first five removes, the third being Danehill, the sire of Banks Hill. Because Danzig is far enough back in his pedigree, Belbek can accommodate more Danzig strains from his mares, and if it’s through the combination of Galileo/Danzig, so much the better.
The Green Desert-line Kingman, for instance, has 10 black-type winners from Galileo-line mares, and note that his G1 Fillies’ Mile winner Commissioning is from a Galileo mare who is out of a mare by Danzig’s Anabaa. And Kingman has Group 3 winner Noble Truth from a Frankel mare, and Frankel, of course, is the premier product of Galileo/Danehill.
However, Belbek shouldn’t be limited by the sire lines and pedigrees he’s crossed with, judging from the vast diversity of ancestors his sire, grandsire, and great-grandsire have succeeded with. Oasis Dream, for example, has sired Group 1 winners from mares by such stallions as Linamix, Acatenango, Shamardal, Kingmambo, Machiavellian, and Sadler’s Wells, among many others. Showcasing’s four Group 1 winners are from mares by Makfi, Inchinor, Haafhd and Pivotal – the sire of Siyouni, who has plenty of daughters in France.
Essentially, there isn’t a limiting or specific pattern of success for this line of stallions, and this is a good thing for Belbek. He should fit a large swath of the broodmare population.
And if he lives up to his race record and pedigree, he’ll fire early and he’ll fire fast.
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