Simply Times Blue Hen Story

Simply Times Blue Hen Story: The $18,000 filly who became fourth dam of Giant Sequoia and Benvenuto Cellini (Breeders Cup Turf at Keeneland), two Group 1 winners in ten days.

Breeders Cup Classic 2026

In a nutshell: Simply Times cost $18,000, fell over on her debut and was tailed off in her only other start. She is also the fourth dam of both Giant Sequoia (Futurity Trophy, Doncaster) and Benvenuto Cellini (Breeders' Cup Turf, Keeneland), who won within the same ten days. Her story is the best argument going that a racing record tells you very little about a broodmare.

If you wanted to design the perfect blue hen on paper, you would not start with Simply Times. You wouldn't even get as far as the second line of her page.

And yet here we are. In the space of ten days, two Group 1 winners, Giant Sequoia at Doncaster and Benvenuto Cellini in the Breeders' Cup Turf at Keeneland, have both turned out to trace back to the same unlikely taproot. Let's have a look at how a cheap filly who barely made it onto a racecourse ended up at the bottom of one of the great families of the moment.

A bargain-basement start

The Simply Times Blue Hen story when she was bought at the OBS yearling sale in Florida in 1995 for $18,000. That's not a lot of money, even then. The buyer was Bill O'Gorman, acting for Allan Belshaw, the Lancashire engineering firm owner for whom he had trained Timeless Times to win a record-equalling 16 races as a two-year-old.

You can see the logic. Timeless Times had been a bit of a cult hero, so the stable name was in there somewhere. But Simply Times was no Timeless Times. Not even close.

She was by Dodge, a Grade 3-winning son of Mr Prospector who didn't stand in Kentucky for long before being sent off to Brazil, and out of Nesian's Burn, a stakes-placed mare tracing back to an Argentinian family. Perfectly respectable, but hardly the stuff of dreams.

Two runs, no joy

Her racing career lasted exactly two races. On her debut at the Newmarket Craven meeting she collapsed and fell as she was mounting a challenge. After a long break she turned up in a lowly Southwell maiden that November, weakened tamely and finished tenth, beaten 16 lengths.

That was that. She was retired and went to stud at three, which in this case turned out to be the best decision anyone made all year.

Newmarket Racecourse

The mare who upgraded her sires

What happened next is the interesting bit. Simply Times bred ten named foals for Belshaw's Times of Wigan operation and every one of them graced a winner's enclosure. Not bad for a mare who couldn't manage it herself.

The best of them were Welsh Emperor, a soft-ground specialist who beat Jeremy and Caradak in the Hungerford Stakes, and Majestic Times, a Listed-winning sprinter. But the real prize was her first foal, Forever Times.

Forever Times was by So Factual, a Nunthorpe winner but otherwise an almost entirely inconsequential sire. Despite that, she won six races from two to five for Tim Easterby, including a couple of trappy Class 3 handicaps at Redcar and Newmarket, and she peaked with an RPR of 98 in a gallant second at York. That's a mare with a hint of something about her, and a mare getting more out of her sire than she should.

The Simply Times Blue Hen story got off to a slow start:she was barren in her first year, then produced a Dansili filly who failed to win in ten starts. But mid-career, she produced two black-type fillies in a row, and those two are why we're all talking about this family today.

Branch one: Question Times to Giant Sequoia

Question Times (Shamardal, 2008) was second in the Bosra Sham Fillies' Stakes at two but didn't win until her sixth start. She was then sold for a mere 50,000gns at the Tattersalls Autumn Horses in Training Sale and ended up with Sweetmans Bloodstock, the Magnier family's Grange Stud outfit in County Cork.

It's fair to say they got their money's worth. She has produced eight winners from eight foals of racing age, starting with the Fastnet Rock filly Diamond Fields, a Gladness Stakes winner who has since produced the International Stakes scorer Aikhal.

Then Question Times met Camelot, twice. The first visit gave us the Irish Derby hero Latrobe. The second, a year later, gave us the Oaks runner-up and Irish Oaks third Pink Dogwood.

Pink Dogwood's first two foals didn't do much on the track. She was sold to Resolute Racing while carrying a Frankel colt, who turned out to be Giant Sequoia. He won the Futurity Stakes at the Curragh in August, and a Group 1 at Doncaster followed last month. Not bad for a horse who is, remember, a great-great-grandson of that tailed-off filly in the Southwell maiden.

Racehorse and Sire Frankel

Branch two: Sunday Times to Benvenuto Cellini

The second black-type filly was Sunday Times (Holy Roman Emperor, 2009), trained by Peter Chapple-Hyam for Belshaw. She was returned to her vendor when bidding stalled at 10,000gns as a yearling, then went on to finish second in the Cheveley Park Stakes and win the Sceptre Stakes.

Belshaw kept hold of her and bred her first six foals, five of whom won. The best was Newspaperofrecord, a Lope De Vega filly who went to America and won the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and the Just A Game Stakes. She was sold privately to Coolmore and White Birch Farm after her racing days were over, and the early returns suggest she was worth every penny.

Her first foal, the Frankel filly Giselle, won the Lingfield Oaks Trial. Her second, another son of Frankel, is Benvenuto Cellini, winner of the Irish Derby and now the Breeders' Cup Turf.

Sunday Times herself was sold to Coolmore for 1,800,000gns at the December Mares Sale in 2021, so everyone in the room had worked out what Belshaw's mares were doing by then.

Why this family could run and run

What makes this such a good story isn't only the two Group 1 winners. It's the depth. Question Times and Sunday Times both have a large number of daughters being well mated:

Diamond Fields has been covered by Kingman this year.

Pink Dogwood has a Justify yearling filly and a Frankel colt foal, and was covered by Frankel again this season.
Future, a Galileo daughter of Question Times, has a Kameko yearling and a Charyn foal.
Classical Times, Sunday Times' first foal, is a winning Lawman filly with Frankel offspring at Juddmonte.
Daily Times was sold in foal for 800,000gns and has two more fillies on the ground for her new owner.
Elegant Times, a half-sister to Forever Times, is the grandam of the French Listed winners Times Square and Trafalgar Square. Times Square was sold for €1.25 million at Arqana.

That's a lot of daughters from a lot of mares being sent to very good stallions. If the family can keep throwing up top-class horses, we could be talking about this one for a very long time.

What breeders can take from Simply Times

It's tempting to shrug and say "racing is random", but there are a few sensible lessons in here.

Don't dismiss a mare because she couldn't run. Simply Times fell on her debut and finished tailed off in her only other start. As a racehorse she was nothing. As a broodmare she was worth her weight in gold.
Look for mares who outperform their sires. Forever Times was by an inconsequential sire and still won six races. When a family keeps doing more than the stallion on paper should allow, take note.
Fillies matter. Question Times and Sunday Times were both good enough to be competitive at the top level, and neither cost much. They then produced the horses that made the family.
The people behind the horse matter too. Sally Aston and her late husband Richard raised most of the Simply Times clan for Belshaw at Goldford Stud in Cheshire, better known as a blue-chip National Hunt nursery.

One to watch at the sales

Goldford Stud is presenting Times Edition, a Kingman mare carrying a foal by Delacroix, at the Sceptre Sessions during the Tattersalls December Mares Sale this month. She is in the remarkable position of having two new Group 1 successes by different horses on her page, thanks to Giant Sequoia and now Benvenuto Cellini.

We could be talking telephone numbers.

All that, from a filly who cost $18,000 and fell over on her debut. Simply Times was simply extraordinary.

Simply Times Blue Hen Story FAQ

Who is Simply Times? She was an American-bred filly by Dodge, bought for $18,000 as a yearling in 1995 and trained for Allan Belshaw. She ran twice without success but became the foundation mare of a hugely successful family.

Which Group 1 winners descend from Simply Times? Giant Sequoia (Futurity Trophy at Doncaster) and Benvenuto Cellini (Irish Derby and Breeders' Cup Turf), who are both descended from her through her first foal, Forever Times.

What is a blue hen? A blue hen is a broodmare whose family keeps producing top-class winners, generation after generation.

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