Kalpana continued the good form of Juddmonte horses when winning the Group 1 QIPCO British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes at Ascot on Saturday afternoon.
Following the Juddmonte operation’s success with Bluestocking in the recent Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at ParisLongchamps, this time the Andrew Balding-trained the three-year-old Kalpana (100/30 favourite) gave Juddmonte another success at the highest level.
Ridden by a confident looking and acting William Buick, the daughter of Study Of Man put the race to bed quickly as she galloped out strongly to account for Aidan O’Brien’s Wingspan (12/1) by two lengths and Tiffany (13/1), from Sir Mark Prescott’s yard, by a further three lengths.
The winning handler Andrew Balding said of Kalpana, who completed a third straight victory:
“I have never known a horse improve as much as Kalpana. I think I even mentioned to Barry [Mahon, head of Juddmonte’s European operations] that we might put her in a sale this time last year! Just every time we started doing more with her, she’s just improved and improved, from Wolverhampton to here in 10 months.
“She is just an absolute diamond, as you can see afterwards. She has a very special temperament and is by an exciting young stallion. She’s from the first crop of Study Of Man, so it’s pretty exciting for them as well.
The winning rider was full of praise for his able partner, Kalpana, admitting:
“Kalpana has an incredible mind and is a jockey’s dream. I parked her up three wide with no cover but she was always comfortable, never wasted any energy and saved the whole way in that ground.
“It is a very special moment because it is my first Group One winner for Andrew. I started with Andrew, and Andrew and his whole family have played a huge part in my career so thank you to him and, obviously, Kalpana; what she did there was very good and she’s only going to improve.”
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