The rise of Qatar as a global force in horse racing has been seismic. In the space of six years the Al Thani family has scaled the heights and become major players at the table of the Sport of Kings.
Sheikh Fahad reportedly watched horse racing on TV for the first time in 2008. He attended his first meeting at the start of 2010 and, by April of that year, had started buying horses. After reportedly giving British bloodstock agent David Redvers a mere £1 million to invest, he achieved remarkable success. In his first year of racing, Fahad's horses won 26% of the races he entered. His French trained Dunaden, purchased for a modest $150,000, won the Melbourne Cup at the first attempt.
Meanwhile, Sheikh Fahad’s cousin Sheikh Joann began racking up successes with 2013 Horse of the Year Treve winner of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, Olympic Glory in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes at Ascot, and Toronado in the Sussex Stakes at Goodwood.
In 2013 Sheikh Joann paid a staggering $8.25 million for the daughter of 2001 Epsom Derby winner Galileo, a world-record fee for a yearling filly. And earlier this year he increased his stable of 110 horses in England and France with Al Shaqab, a breeding operation set up by his brother Hamad back in 1992.
Last year Sheikh Joann appointed Harry Herbert, who runs England's prestigious Highclere stud as racing adviser to his Al Shaqab operation with the stated ambition to become "one of the leading forces in thoroughbred racing."
Finally, veteran champion and the sport’s poster boy, Frankie Dettori, became Sheikh Joann's retained jockey.
One feels there is more still to come.
