We had purchased her dam, Nigh, at the Arqana Vente d’ Elevage of December 2015. We had known the mare having boarded her here at our stud for her French owners. She had produced a most beautiful Camelot colt while in our care and although he turned out to be of little consequence, his looks encouraged us to buy Nigh in foal to Charm Spirit.

It was in 2017 that we decided to breed Nigh on the productive Galileo-Danehill cross. As she was a Galileo mare, we went looking for a Danehill stallion and alighted on Fastnet Rock at Coolmore in Ireland.

Bred on a foal share, she produced the subsequently named Via Sistina in 2018. A big girl from the moment she was born, she was slow to progress into a yearling. The Tattersalls representative who arrived at the stud to inspect likely sales prospects chose to overlook her, as did multiple (including world renowned) bloodstock agents and her co-breeders, Coolmore. But she did one thing well that was to be the key to her future success- she walked as if on air with a huge, light-footed stride.

With some serious arm twisting, Tattersalls allotted her a slot in their December yearling sale where she was purchased for 5000 guineas by Steven Hillen. Decent people and good judges, Steven and his wife Rebecca were to be well rewarded for taking a risk with the, at the time, big gangly but light-footed filly bred on a great cross.

Via Sistina began to come into her own as a three-year-old and a facile win in a good race at Goodwood marked her out as one for the future. After her ready progress to Group 1 success in Ireland and the UK, her swansong was to be 2^nd, after a final furlong tussle, to King of Steel in the Champion Stakes at Ascot in October 2023. It was a memorable race for our stud. As we stood in front of the TV watching the closing stages, who should we shout for- King of Steel, the Wootton Bassett colt, or Via Sistina. It is fair to say the Laundry Cottage Stud Farm played a fair part in the climax to the 2023 racing season.

The Hillen’s cashed in when selling her to Yulong for 2.5 million guineas at Tattersalls in December 2023 and she immediately was shipped off to Australia to, we all thought, be covered by a top Aussie stallion. Not a bit of it though as she went on to win a further 9 Group 1 races taking her total to 11. Her prize money over her career approached £10million and, retired with a Racing Post Rating of 125 in early 2026, she had achieved the honour on being the World’s No1 Filly/Mare in 2024 and the Worlds No3 racehorse of that year, surpassed only by 2 colts.

If Wootton Bassett was a flash in the pan, how come this small stud had another flash in the pan so soon? Rightly or wrongly, we believe that doing everything to turn the odds of producing a top racehorse in our favour, is the recipe for success.

So, choose a proven mating match, look for complimentary confirmation, send your mare to the stallion in pristine condition, inside and out. Feed with care, handle every day, keep her air clear and clean and run her outside as much as possible. Be ready for the birth, keep her cord intact for as long as possible to set the foal up well. Watch the foal’s conformation develop every day and offer her top-class farriery and veterinary care. Handle the foal every day….and so on. Make sure she goes to the right sale and hope she goes to the right trainer.

So much is still left to chance, but the probabilities have been tweaked as much as they can be and just maybe there might be a ‘flash in the pan’ to celebrate!