Tuesday, 9 January 2018: Pierro is achieving results with his first crop of three-year-olds that at least equal or outstrip the likes of stud greats such as Zabeel, Savabeel and Lonhro.

With his oldest progeny just five months into their classic racing season, Pierro’s 83 runners to date boast 35 winners (41%), 7 stakeswinners (8%), 4 Group winners (5%) and two G1 performers (Pinot and Tulip).
Lonhro at the same stage of his breeding career had 67 runners for 28 winners (42%), 2 SWs (3%), no GWs and zero G1 horses.

Pierro

Savabeel had 54 runners at the same stage for 14 winners (26%), 3 SWs (5.5%), 1 GW (2%), one G1 horse.
Zabeel had 67 runners for 24 winners (36%), 4 SWs (6%), 2 GWs (3%) and one G1 horse, ironically Pierro’s grandsire Octagonal.
Pierro boasts 10 2yo winners while Zabeel had sired six 2yo winners and Savabeel just four at the same stage.
Exciting colt Pierata and the promising filly Aqua D’Ivina are the latest 3YO flagbearers for Pierro.
The lightly raced Aqua D’Ivina made it back-to-back wins in at Randwick last Saturday having won her maiden at Wyong December 21 from just four starts.
The Matthew Smith-trained Aqua D’Ivina was a $150,000 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale by Frank and Christine Cook, who hold significant thoroughbred interests with a number of trainers.
Aqua D’Ivina is the seventh foal out of G1 Futurity Stakes winner Aqua D’Amore (Danehill), who won nine races including four at stakes level. The dam of five winners e-trained mare, she is a three-quarter sister to G2 Sandown Guineas winner Petrology (Fastnet Rock) and the stakesplaced River Wild (Fastnet Rock).
Aqua D’Ivina has a two-year-old brother purchased for $90,000 at last year’s Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale and Coolmore will offer her half-brother by former shuttler Uncle Mo this week.
Pierata  became Pierro’s seventh stakes winner with all seven carrying the influence of Danehill on the dam’s side.
Already placed at G2 level last season, Pierata has now won three times, with prizemoney topping $270,000.
That sum could grow dramatically as he is eligible to collect the $500,000 summer crown bonus offered by Racing Queensland on top of $1.2 million prizemoney if he can win Saturday’s Magic Millions 3YO Guineas.
It would be the richest pay day for one horse in Queensland racing history and take Pierata’s earnings close to $3 million – a big dividend on the $160,000 he cost as a Magic Millions purchase for trainer Greg Hickman.
Pierata was bred by Grahame and Sue Mapp of Hobartville Stud out of the Flying Spur mare November Flight, who produced a colt foal by Rubick last spring.
Owing to a covering season setback in 2015, Pierro has only a limited yearling draft on offer in 2018.
Pierro has only 17 for Magic Millions, nine for Sydney Classic, four for the NZB Premier Sale at Karaka and 11 for Melbourne Premier with the balance at Easter in Sydney.
One of his stand-out offerings at the Magic Millions Gold Coast sale is a colt out of the Mick Price-trained G3-winning Fastnet Rock mare Jazz Song.
Another impressive Pierro colt bred on the same Pierro x Fastnet Rock ‘cross’ is out of Pickin’ Time, a stakes-placed mare by Fastnet Rock from the family of triple G1 winner Special Harmony.
Three of the four Pierro yearlings to be offered by Coolmore at the 2018 Magic Millions Gold Coast sale are out of Fastnet Rock mares.
They include a Pierro filly out of Casquets, a Listed SW by Fastnet Rock and a half-sister to SW Ballet Suite, and a colt out of stakes-placed mare Princess Quality, whose own dam is a Danehill sister to champion 2yo and successful G1 sire Holy Roman Emperor.
Princess Quality is by Elusive Quality, also the dams sire of Pierro’s talented South African SW Roy Had Enough.
A $95,000 Magic Millions purchase in 2016 for World Wide Bloodstock, Roy Had Enough is from a daughter of dual G1-winning Australian Oaks queen Danendri.