Equiano’s daughter Belvoir Bay won her fifth Stakes race when landing the Mizdirection Stakes on the 6.5f hillside turf course at Santa Anita on Sunday 25th March.

The success was all the more remarkable as it was Belvoir Bay’s first race back since surviving the fires at the San Luis Rey Downs training facility in San Diego in December 2017.  She took the worst of it among the horses owned by Team Valor International having been let loose to survive and not found again until several hours later with several scrapes on her hind legs.  The five-year-old mare had already survived a storm that destroyed the barn around her at San Luis Rey in January 2016.

Owned by Team Valor International & Gary Barber and trained by Peter Miller, this exceptionally tough and game mare has previously won the Gr.3 Senator Ken Maddy Stakes at the Breeders Cup last year, as well as the Gr.3 Torrey Pines Stakes and the Listed Unzip Me Stakes and Blue Norther Stakes.

Bred in Britain, Belvoir Bay is another top-class mare from the breeding legacy of the late Mrs Peacock.  She is out of Path of Peace (Rock of Gibraltar), a half-sister to Gr.2 winner Please Sing (Royal Applause), and is a great example of how her sire Equiano is working over both Danehill and Green Desert mares.  As a yearling she was purchased by Peter & Ross Doyle Bloodstock at the Tattersalls October Sales in 2014.

She capped a successful weekend for Equiano, with five winners in total by the ‘King of Speed’ including the Gr.2 winning two-year-old Medicine Jack looking like an exciting horse-to-follow this season following his 6f success at Naas for trainer Get Lyons, and Mashiana winning the Preis der VR Bank Rhein Neckar eG – Saibaba Zukunfts-Cup at Mannheim by five lengths.