GILLTOWN TRIP:DURING A tumultuous 2009 season that propelled him to legendary status, Sea The Stars was described by his trainer John Oxx as the culmination of 300 years of thoroughbred breeding.
So royalty of the equine and human variety will meet when Queen Elizabeth travels to Co Kildare to see the great horse today.
Coming to the end of his second season as an €85,000 a cover stallion at Gilltown Stud, Sea The Stars will be visited by the Queen, whose trip to the stud farm situated outside Kilcullen will be hosted by owner the Aga Khan.
It will be the latest meeting of the royals who have enjoyed a long relationship, with the Queen having bestowed the “His Highness” title on the Aga Khan in 1957.
The Aga Khan is the spiritual leader of some 15 million Ismaili Muslims of the Shia faith scattered around the world.
The Queen’s passion for the racing and breeding industries has been a feature of her reign. She owns the favourite for next month’s Epsom Derby, Carlton House, who won the Dante Stakes impressively at York last week. The Derby is the one English classic race the Queen has yet to win.
In contrast, the Aga Khan has won the Derby on four occasions, just one less than his grandfather, the third Aga Khan, who established an extensive breeding empire in Ireland in the 1920s. Gilltown was one of six studs inherited by the current Aga but he sold it in 1974 before buying it back 18 years later. He owns four studs in Ireland.
The Aga Khan no longer owns Ballymany Stud on the edge of the Curragh from where his most famous horse, 1981 Derby winner Shergar, was kidnapped in 1983. Despite that blow, the Aga Khan has expanded his racing interests in Ireland in recent decades and has a large number of horses in training here with John Oxx and Michael Halford.
Johnny Murtagh is his retained jockey in the Republic.
His generosity to the racing industry in Ireland was emphasised in 2003 when he bought a hotel at the back of the stands at the Curragh and gifted it to the Turf Club to allow an extensive €100 million facelift of the famous racecourse.
The gesture cost the Aga Khan a reputed €15 million.
However, prolonged planning difficulties with the project repeatedly delayed construction and by the time the go-ahead was finally given by the authorities, the bottom had fallen out of the Irish economy.
There is a long history between the British royal family and the Aga Khan’s and much of it revolves around horses. When the then princess Elizabeth married Philip Mountbatten in November 1947, the third Aga Khan gave her a filly by Turkhan, out of Hastra, which she called Astrakhan.
In 2008, the Queen hosted a dinner at Buckingham Palace to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of the Aga Khan’s accession to the title. Reports indicate that horses and racing have been known to dominate conversation between the two and the bloodstock on view today will give them much to talk about.
The Aga Khan stands two stallions he bred himself, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe winner Dalakhani, and Azamour, at Gilltown. He also beat off competition from around the world to stand Sea The Stars when that superstar horse was retired.
There is also an extensive band of broodmares at Gilltown.
The Queen’s broodmare operation isn’t as extensive but she holds the upper hand this year with Carlton House among the leading lights of his generation. But whether he will be as good as Sea The Stars is debatable!
