Things have never been easy for Farhh, either as a racehorse or as a stallion. But his quality ultimately shone through in an injury-plagued racing career and, despite crops restricted by fertility issues, he’s beginning to make his mark at stud now too, as events at Royal Ascot highlighted recently.

Farhh was in training for four seasons, but the only one of those in which he was able to enjoy anything like a full campaign was when he was a four-year-old. Even then, he had the bad luck to be a contemporary of Frankel, coming up against him in both the Sussex Stakes and Juddmonte International that season. Two more second places in Group 1 company in 2012 came in the Eclipse Stakes won by Nathaniel and the Prix du Moulin when a head behind the high-class French filly Moonlight Cloud.

Kept in training at five, Farhh was restricted to just two starts five months apart but made both count with Frankel now out of his way at stud. In fact, he followed in Frankel’s footsteps by winning the Lockinge Stakes at Newbury and the Champion Stakes at Ascot. He went out on a high on soft ground in the Champion Stakes, beating former winner Cirrus des Aigles and Derby winner Ruler of The World in a close finish.

Farhh is by no means alone among Pivotal’s progeny in going well on soft ground, and one who evidently appreciated the wet start to Royal Ascot this year was his son Addeybb, winner of the Wolferton Stakes.

Equally effective at a mile and a mile and a quarter, Farhh, however, was a very different racehorse from his altogether speedier sire, winner of the King’s Stand Stakes and Nunthorpe. But given the right sort of mare, Pivotal had already shown that he wasn’t simply a sire of sprinters with the 2009 Oaks and Irish Oaks winner Sariska among his best offspring. Sariska’s half-sister Gull Wing produced three more good winners by Pivotal over middle distances or further, namely Eagle Top (King Edward VII Stakes), Wings of Desire (Dante Stakes) and The Lark (Park Hill Stakes). The Lark was third in the Oaks and Wings of Desire fourth in the Derby.

Farhh was another result of a mating between Pivotal and a stoutly-bred mare. Indeed, the first three mares in the bottom line of his pedigree were by Lando, Slip Anchor and Windwurf, all of them Derby winners, Slip Anchor at Epsom and the other two in Germany. His dam Gonbarda enjoyed an excellent three-year-old season in Germany that included Group 1 wins in the Deutschlandpreis at Dusseldorf and the Preis von Europa at Cologne. Sold privately to Godolphin, Gonfalon never ran in the royal blue but has produced other good winners in those colours, including Farhh’s brothers Racing History and Basem. The still entire seven-year-old Racing History has had a similarly stop-start career to Farhh’s, but ran well in Dubai earlier in the year, notably when beaten a short head in the Group 2 Dubai City of Gold.

Further evidence of the stamina in Farhh’s family comes from his grandam’s three-parts sister Gryada who produced the Irish Derby winner Fame And Glory, later winner of the Gold Cup as a five-year-old.

Farhh joined Pivotal on the list of successful sires at Royal Ascot when his four-year-old daughter Move Swiftly, a member of his first crop, won the Group 2 Duke of Cambridge Stakes over a mile. Over the same trip earlier in the year, his current best three-year-old King of Cambiar excelled himself by finishing second in the 2000 Guineas.

But the stamina in Farhh’s pedigree is very much in evidence in the pick of his other leading offspring, notably his highest profile horse to date Dee Ex Bee. Farhh’s only other Royal Ascot runner, Dee Ex Bee ran well to finish second to Stradivarius in the Gold Cup. Dee Ex Bee first made a name for himself at three when runner-up in the Derby, though fourth place in the St Leger hinted that staying was going to be his game, something he confirmed earlier this year with wins over two miles in the Sagaro Stakes and Henry II Stakes.

Dee Ex Bee’s great grandam is the outstanding broodmare Fall Aspen whose winners over an array of distances included Mazzacano who gained some compensation for finishing second in the Gold Cup by winning the Goodwood Cup – perhaps it will be the same for Dee Ex Bee. Another of Fall Aspen’s offspring to exhibit more stamina than speed was her daughter Colorado Dancer (by Irish Derby winner Shareef Dancer) who won the Prix de Pomone at Deauville when it was run over thirteen and a half furlongs. Dee Ex Bee is out of Colorado Dancer’s unraced daughter Dubai Sunrise who is by Seeking The Gold, making her a full sister to Dubai Millennium no less.

Other notable members of Farhh’s first crop who have shown ability over longer trips than he tackled himself include Wells Farhh Go, winner of the thirteen-furlong Bahrain Trophy, the Prix Hocquart winner Nocturnal Fox and Elegiac, winner of the listed Barry Hills Further Flight Stakes at Nottingham in April over a mile and three quarters. Wells Farhh Go, another who was being aimed at the St Leger, but who missed the latter part of 2018, had come to hand early enough to win the Acomb Stakes at York as a two-year-old over seven furlongs.