Exciting Daughter Of Starspangledbanner Lands Group 2 Prize
The Group 2 Blue Diamond Prelude (5 ½f) at Caulfield on Saturday was won by Palm Angel (2f Starspangledbanner x Noblest, by Pivotal).
Trained by Jason Warren and ridden by Ethan Brown, Palm Angel won the Listed Merson Cooper Stakes on debut last spring and then finished fifth when coming back from a spell, but bounced out of that run to produce a new career best performance.
The favourite, My Gladiola, drew wide and went forward to lead and gave a good kick at the furlong pole, but when Palm Angel angled out of her slipstream, she surged past the grey to win by a length with Wootton Bassett filly Wiltshire Square racking up her third stakes placing from three starts.
This win brought Palm Angel’s prizemoney total to $336,600 (€205,000) and she will head to the Group 1 Blue Diamond Stakes next, giving every impression that the 6f will suit her even better.
Ethan Brown has ridden Palm Angel in all three of her starts and is full of praise for the talented chesnut.
"She's got a great constitution, she's a little racehorse,” he said.
"I only hit her once or twice, she did the rest herself, and it was quite a soft win."
"The ability to deal with pressure and she does that just fine.”
Palm Angel is a half-sister to stakes-placed Narbold and is the second winner from three to race from blue-blood Pivotal mare Noblest, a winning sister to dual Group I-winning miler Peeress, the grand-dam of this year’s Group 1 Newbury Lockinge Stakes winner Audience as well as Group 3 winners Esquire and Dark Lady.
Noblest was bought by Rosemont Stud at the 2016 Arqana December Breeding Stock Sale for €125,000.
Palm Angel is by outstanding sire Starspangledbanner, who covered Noblest again in 2023 resulting in another filly born last year and she is now in foal to Churchill.
Palm Angel is the third stakes-winner from the Starspangledbanner x Pivotal cross, joining Group 3 Sceptre Stakes winner Spangled and fellow Aussie Group 2 winner Brooklyn Hustle, who was also bred and raced by Rosemont Stud.