Written by Bren O'Brien
Group 1-winning mare Aqua D'Amore (Danehill {USA}) continues to make her presence felt from the breeding barn with Yes Yeah Always (No Nay Never {USA}) becoming the Coolmore resident's seventh individual winner with his maiden victory at Warrnambool on Thursday.
Aqua D'Amore was a star, albeit an occasionally reluctant one, in the Coolmore colours on the racetrack for trainer Gai Waterhouse, winning nearly $2 million and nine races, including a G1 Futurity S.
The powerful mare, who also won a G2 Villiers S. and two Group 3 races, developed a habit of sitting down on the barriers before a race, with stewards eventually compelled to stop her from racing.
Aqua D'Amore, winner of the 2007 G1 Futurity S. | Image courtesy of Sportpix
However, she has certainly not shirked the task as a broodmare, producing foals in each of her first 10 trips to the breeding barn. She missed for the first time in 2018, but has since produced three more foals the past three seasons, and at the age of 20, is in foal to Magna Grecia (Ire).
Her yearlings have always proven popular in the sales ring, selling up to $680,000, while seven of her eight runners have been winners.
Last month, the grand old mare celebrated her first stakes winner when the Bjorn Baker-trained Parry Sound (Pierro) won the G3 Summer Cup at Randwick. It is the same race that Aqua D'Amore had won herself 16 years previously.
Parry Sound (red cap), winner of the G3 Summer Cup | Image courtesy of Ashlea Brennan
Prior to that, the foal of hers which most looked like living up to her dam's considerable ability was the five-time winner Aqua D'Ivina (Pierro), while Diamond Legend (More Than Ready {USA}) was a three-time winner in Hong Kong.
On Thursday, 4-year-old gelding Yes Yeah Always, having his fifth start for trainer Shane Nichols, delivered his first win, holding on over the 2000 metres after coming with a swooping run around the corner for jockey Lachlan Neindorf.
He held off locally trained Charlie's Tin (Myboycharlie {Ire}) by 0.5l on the line with Divaring (Sebring) in third.
Yes Yeah Always winning at Warrnambool
Nichols came together with Matthew Sandblom to pay $100,000 for Yes Yeah Always at the 2019 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, where he was offered by Coolmore.
That trainer and ownership pair enjoyed considerable success with Group 1-winning mare I Am A Star (NZ) (I Am Invincible), whose yearling colt by Deep Field sold to Nichols for $800,000 at the recent Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale.
Also selling at that Sale was Aqua D'Amore's yearling colt by Pierro, the eighth of her yearlings to go through that Sale over the years. He was purchased by On Track Thoroughbreds for $200,000.
She produced a foal filly to Calyx (GB) last year, while she also has a 2-year-old daughter by Caravaggio (USA) which was purchased by Ciaron Maher Bloodstock last year.
