Horse Profile: Bradsell

Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint Scouting Report

(Editor's note: Originally published in the 2024 BRISnet Breeders' Cup International Report)

One year after being scratched from the Turf Sprint, Bradsell returns with an enhanced portfolio as Europe’s leading five-furlong performer. The Archie Watson speedster captured two “Win and You’re In” events, the Nunthorpe (G1) and Flying Five (G1), and nearly collected another ticket in the Prix de l’Abbaye (G1) on Arc Day. 

The one thing that Bradsell doesn’t have is the experience of racing around a turn, and now he’s parked out in post 12. Maybe one day that stat will be rendered immaterial, but so far, the only European-based winner of this race (Glass Slippers in 2020) had turning experience at least earlier in her career. 

Yet Bradsell’s running style should serve him well. Blessed with the early speed to put himself in the vanguard, he then maintains that fierce tempo for the duration. He’s been operating at a high level for all three seasons of racing, despite an injury-punctuated career that’s forced him to launch comebacks.

Hero of the 2022 Coventry (G2) at Royal Ascot after a nine-length debut romp at York, Bradsell was favored to extend his unbeaten sequence in the Phoenix (G1). But he stumbled out of the gate, wound up fourth behind Little Big Bear, and exited with a season-ending injury.

After Bradsell returned as a sophomore with third-place efforts at six furlongs, he shortened up to five furlongs for Royal Ascot’s King’s Stand (G1). It proved to be the making of him, as Bradsell fended off favorite Highfield Princess by a length. He wasn’t able to add another prize last season, checking in third in the Nunthorpe and seventh in the Flying Five, before his fruitless trip to Santa Anita.

The four-year-old model of Bradsell has been stronger and more consistent. He used the Aug. 4 Prix du Cercle at Deauville as his springboard to the Nunthorpe. Leveraging his beneficial draw into an ideal stalking trip at York, Bradsell got the jump on Believing, and left Big Evs behind in a subpar eighth. In the Flying Five at the Curragh, Bradsell again had a better post than Believing, and he raced away near the stands’ side. Very soft going at Longchamp likely sapped him in the Abbaye, where mudlark Makarova passed him late.

The Breeders’ Cup will be Bradsell’s swan song, as he is set to retire to the National Stud in Newmarket. He is the top performer by Tasleet, a Group 2-winning sprinter by Showcasing (and from the family of champion Battaash) who was perhaps unfortunate not to earn a Group 1 laurel himself. Bradsell’s dam is a stakes-winning daughter of globetrotter Archipenko, whom U.S. fans might remember as the runner-up in the 2008 Arlington Million (G1).