Stamper makes her mark

Racing

Miss Stamper, who picked up a swift pounds 55,000 for her connections when winning the Weatherbys Super Sprint Stakes at Newbury in July, added another pounds 70,000 to her earnings with an emphatic victory in the Tattersalls Breeders' Stakes at the Curragh yesterday.

These cash-rich prizes for two-year-olds, who qualify by dint of having passed through a particular sales ring might be good fun and a chance to win racing's equivalent of the lottery for those extremely affluent individuals that the wealthy racing industry laughably refers to as "small owners". But they are a joke in terms of producing quality animals and look anomalous when set against the European Racing Pattern.

And for those who remember Vincent O'Brien's farming of the Group Three Anglesey Stakes - relegated to last race on the card with a first prize of just pounds 16,000 yesterday - with various smart two-year-olds in years gone by, the discrepancy in prize-money and prestige between the two contests is hard to digest.

Nevertheless Miss Stamper, who cost 7,500 guineas as a yearling, deserves credit for a useful performance. She stormed home up the stands rail to beat Paddy Lad by three lengths and may yet turn out to be a cut above the usual standard of winners in this sort of contest.

Earlier on, John Reid produced Robert Sangster's Equal Rights with a perfectly timed challenge to capture the Group Three Futurity Stakes. Held up, as John Dunlop's Groom's Gordon made the running in the one mile juvenile contest, Equal Rights quickened impressively approaching the final furlong to take charge, beating Mick Channon's staying-on Recondite by one and a half lengths at the line with Beautiful Fire denying Groom's Gordon of third place close home.

"We made the running with him at Goodwood, which was a mistake. He showed his true worth here and he may just have one more run - in the Royal Lodge Stakes at Ascot or the Racing Post Trophy at Doncaster - before we put him away until next year," said the winning trainer Peter Chapple-Hyam.

The owner-breeder Sangster made the trip to see Equal Rights step up on his promoted third to Putra at Goodwood. "He did it well and should be a nice horse next season," said Sangster.

At Sandown, Wandering Star left her trainer James Fanshawe hoping she can help resurrect a disappointing season after the filly landed the Listed Lyceum Atalanta Stakes.

The filly became only the trainer's 13th win of the campaign when weaving through the field to snatch a length victory over Miss Universal.

Fanshawe believes Wandering Star, ridden by Nigel Day, is capable of even better and has mapped out an ambitious autumn programme. "She appreciates give in the ground and is pretty fresh. I think she will get 10 furlongs so there should be plenty of races for her, including the Sun Chariot Stakes at Newmarket and Prix de l'Opera at Longchamp," he said.

At Chester, Richard Hannon's two-year-old Andreyev booked himself a possible trip to Newmarket for the Middle Park Stakes in October by landing the Linenhall Stakes.