In 2007 King’s Theatre was the chosen sire for Perrotine, since I had belatedly begun to accept what my work on Stallion Statistics had been telling me for years, that good though Old Vic, Presenting, Flemensfirth, Oscar and Beneficial were, he was better. Unfortunately, we hadn’t reckoned with another equally obvious factor, Perrotine’s temperament. When she was brought into the foaling box, having shown signs of imminent labour, she stressed herself all night at the absence of her bosom friend of the time and refused to foal. She was put out in a field the next day and watched carefully – but not carefully enough. At around lunchtime we saw her standing above an object in the field. The object was a dead filly foal, one of only two we ever lost at birth.
Returned to King;s Theatre, Perrotine produced a filly foal, who we named La Doelenaise after a poster we saw on a wall when on holiday in France, this time pushing out the bag within seconds of delivery. ‘Dolly’ was another good-looking filly; and she initially went to Ireland to be raised but was then brought back to England when for some reason we thought this would be a good idea.
Unfortunately, whilst in the process of relocation she suffered a slight injury to a hind fetlock that became badly infected before she got to us. When our vet, Phil Dyson, saw her he described her as ‘a dead horse walking’. However, he attempted what he described as the ‘desperate remedy’ of removing the tendon at the site of the infection. This saved her life; but there remained a significant bump on the site of the operation and it was impossible to sell her as a store. Even when she had shown her ability by placing twice in France, a prospective sale fell through after she was ‘spun’ by the vet.
Because she could not be sold unraced, ‘Dolly’ was sent to France to be trained by Jean-Paul Gallorini and more than earned her keep, without either winning or gaining Black-Type. Her first race was the Listed Prix Finot (Pouliches) Hurdle at Auteuil, which was the only time I saw her race, though only just, after a ‘leisurely’ 90 minute drive from my hotel turned into a nightmare 2½ hour dash across and around Paris after I put the wrong ‘Auteuil’ into the Satnav.
She finished fifth, not far off the vital ‘Black-Type’ and just behind L’Unique, who later won a Grade 1 race. She was then sixth at Enghein before gaining her best result when narrowly beaten at the same track, finishing wide of the winner who headed her close home. My friend Julie Thomas’s Listed-placed Lecon Benefique was third. She ended her Autumn campaign by running third in another Enghein hurdle.
We then ‘sold’ her to go to Philip Hobbs but the swelling – or perhaps some other factor that showed up – caused her to fail the veterinary examination; so, after a winter break in England, she returned to M. Gallorini for a Spring campaign. However, she was not the same horse, falling in a hurdle at Auteuil and then being unplaced in two others. She was reported as having a lung infection and at that point we retired her. For other reasons the partnership between Bryan and Sandra Mayoh ended; and, as regards La Doelenaise, a somewhat different one with Peter Hockenhull began.
Dolly’s early foals were by Fair Mix and Lucarno, matings that with hindsight were not exactly helpful to her cause, and neiiher raced; whilst the three racecourse efforts of her over-excitable 2017 Telescope filly, Galaxy Dancer, were deeply unimpressive. She is now a broodmare in Ireland, clearly in the possession of an optimist.
We had hopes for her 2018 sister, named Spice Heaven after an Indian restaurant we sometimes visit with Peter and Emma – although proprietor Mr Abdul seemed to think we were joking when we told him we were expecting him to lead her round the parade ring wearing a ‘Spice Heaven’ restaurant jacket. It seemed were were, though not intending it, when ‘Spicey’ finished well behind twice when trained by Jamie Snowden. I gave my share away to Peter after that, concerned by a foreleg injury; but Spicey fared no better when he in turn gave her to trainer Chris Honour, for it soon became evident that the apparently-healed injury had left its mark.
Dolly’s most recent runners, the gelding Theatre Chief and the filly Put A Lid On It, both by Dartmouth, have run with promise on their only races though finishing unplaced. They were followed by a 2021 gelding by Telescope, sold to Hugh Bleahen as a foal and resold by him to Point-to-Point trainer Matthew Flynn O’Connor for €35,000 as a 3YO; a 2022 filly by Telescope, who went to trainer Oliver Greenall for only £2,000; a 2023 filly by Logician that brought €7,500, and a 2024 colt by the same sire, who in the co-owners’ entirely unbiased eyes is the best she has yet produced.
With her record of 6 foals of racing age, 4 runners, 0 winners and 0 placed horses, La Doelenaise has nor exactly got off to a flying start as a broodmare. With at least four more horses likely to race for her, we are hoping for mich better – she is too well-bred and too good a model not to succeed. Shurely?
Generally, Dolly has a calmer temperament than her mother, but this should not be remarked upon. Once when it was, after she had returned home from a ‘summer holiday’ elsewhere, she indicated her rejection of this proposition by rearing over the chest-high partition of her stable and then demolishing it as her hind-legs crashed through. More recently, she damaged a foreleg in a manner that was never fully explained when in a box with her foal at Shade Oak. Whilst bandaged up to recover from this, she then decided it would be a good idea to bite off the bandages and reopen the wound. On second thoughts, remembering Dolly’s initial injury when she came back from Ireland, maybe I haven’t got it quite right about the ‘calmer temoerament’!
La Doelenaise’s full breeding record can be viewed by clicking on the Broodmares tab. I try not to do this too often!
You can read the story of La Perrotine’s next foal, and most outstanding product, by clicking on SIZING JOHN.