OCTOBER - NOVEMBER 2008

The late Maj. Pradeep Mehra, founder of the Usha Stud, had an uncommonly good eye for what makes a “tap-root” broodmare. A cursory glance at the names of the ten head he selected in England in the winter of 1976 reveals the fact that no less than seven – Amber Forest, Celandine, Clocked, Fine Array, Happy Shark, Miss Goolagong, and Tina’s Way – have founded families that are delivering stakes winners with regularity to this day, more than 3 decades later.
Many of these mares were acquired at bargain basement prices, none more so than the very first to be bought, Fine Array, who was sent up by Dr. Carlo Vittadini as Lot No. 833 on the first day of the Tattersalls Newmarket December Sales of 1976. The daughter of Royal Record required an outlay of a mere 540 guineas to change hands, making her a real “steal” considering she was a Group winner (Premio Royal Mares, Gr.3, in Turin, Italy) in foal, on a May covering, to an Epsom Derby winner (St. Paddy). Probably the fact that she had been barren in the previous two years, and taken her time to conceive in 1976, had put other potential buyers off.
Fine Array duly foaled a chestnut filly on 3rd April 1977, which however could not race. Retained as a potential broodmare, she was initially named St. Paddy’s Gift, which was later changed to Fine’st. Fine Array did have a couple of other foals in India, namely the more-than-useful filly Quintana (1978 by Grey Gaston), and the modest gelding Arrow (1980 by Grey Gaston), but it is only through her got-abroad daughter that her line survives.
Fine’st started off inauspiciously, her first named foal Austerity (1983 by Common Land) being unable to do better than placing, but she made up for it all with her very next offspring, Kir Royale (1984 by Grey Gaston). Trained for Mr. & Mrs. Vijay Mallya and Maj. P.K. Mehra by Bezan Chenoy, he showed his class by taking the Pune Derby, Gr.2, of 1987, then shaped as the winner in the McDowell Indian Derby, Gr.1, before being mowed down by Cordon Bleu and Enrico, who coincidentally also raced for the Mallyas. Exactly ten years later Fine’st bred another good one in Archimedes (1994 by Razeen), who went one better when runner-up to Star Supreme in the McDowell Indian Derby, Gr.1, of 1998.
In between, Fine’st produced the one that matters – a 1988-born Treasure Leaf daughter who raced in the Dhunjibhoy silks under the name of Slickchic and won a couple of minor races. Sent initially to the Poonawalla Estates Stud, where she conceived to Riyahi, she was returned to her birthplace to foal the first of four stakes-placed runners, the good class colt Pertigalete (1994). Thereafter she visited only the resident stallions at the Usha Stud, Razeen, Steinbeck and China Visit, coming up with nine further winners of which All Heart (1996 by Steinbeck), third in the Mysore 1000 Guineas, Gr.3, Capture The Moment (2000 by Razeen), runner-up in the Gen. Rajendrasinhji Trophy, Gr.3, and Sir Onslaught (2003 by Razeen), third in the Alcock Arabian Stakes, Gr.3, earned “black type”.
Trained initially in Bangalore by veteran Zareer Darashah, All Heart scored twice for him before relocating to the yard of Vijay Singh at Calcutta, where she notched up the last of her three victories. She has spent her entire paddock career at the stud where she was born, and visited Razeen in her first four seasons, gaining stardom as a broodmare with her fourth foal (and first colt), the physically impressive Autonomy, whose record is too well known to need repeating. It suffices to say that he is the best male seen so far from the 2005 crop.

- Anil Mukhi