Laundry Cottage Stud

Colin and Melba Bryce and Simon Cooper featured among the headline winners at the Thoroughbred Breeders' Association (TBA) Flat Breeders' Awards for the 2025 season, sponsored by Ace Stud, which took place at Chippenham Park on Wednesday evening. The Bryces received the prestigious Andrew Devonshire Bronze, which recognises exceptional achievement and contribution to the British thoroughbred breeding industry, in front of 170 guests, including their daughter and awards host, Gina Bryce. Laundry Cottage Stud has become one of British breeding's great boutique success stories with the Bryces at the helm....

Charles Briere's Fairway Consignment was responsible for two of the top three lots during Tuesday's opening session of the Arqana February Mixed Sale, including the Listed-winning hurdler Elektrix (Gemix), who was knocked down to Hubert Barbe of Horse Racing Advisory - bidding on behalf of Haras de Couëly - for €80,000. Offered as lot 113, Elektrix enjoyed her career highlight when winning the Listed Prix Gaston Branere at Auteuil in April last year. The five-year-old is out of another talented hurdler in the G3 Prix Pierre de Lassus winner and...

The boy-made-good story of Wootton Bassett is as time-honoured as life itself. To a degree, it is a rags-to-riches tale, particularly when it comes to the phenomenal trajectory of his stallion career. And it is a story which is ending far too soon. The 17-year-old stallion died on Tuesday at Coolmore Australia in the Hunter Valley after developing acute pneumonia from a bout of choke, a condition in which food blocks the oesophagus, often leading to complications. His passing comes at a time when Wootton Bassett was in his pomp;...

Colin and Melba Bryce's Laundry Cottage Stud is home to 15 broodmares and, though the Hertfordshire operation could certainly be described as boutique, its paddocks have witnessed the formative years of two of the most talked-about horses of recent times. Wootton Bassett (GB) was born there in 2008 and the Group 1-winning juvenile-turned-supersire now commands a stud fee of €300,000. A decade later came Via Sistina (Ire), a 5,000-guinea yearling who became a multi-millionaire on the track and was the top-rated mare in the world last year. While Melba, who...