'Dubai' mystery in Australia

With the purchase of Dubai Excellence for $300,000, Australian breeder Ted van Heemst thought he was buying into the bloodlines of the late Dubai Millennium. Instead, he has a stallion whose identity is unknown but who is definitely not Dubai Excellence.

DNA tests have proved that the horse exported from England by Sheikh Mohammed's Darley Stud to stand in Australia at Evergreen Stud in Perth is not Dubai Excellence, according to the Racing Post.

Doubts began to circulate shortly after the horse arrived at the Western Australia stud farm this summer. Dubai Excellence, a half-brother to Dubai Millennium, is 15-3 hands high, but the horse received at Evergreen was shorter. Nor did he show any sign of the tendon damage that had forced Dubai Excellence's retirement after a single race. The real Dubai Excellence was also supposed to have a microchip imbedded in his leg for identification, but the horse in question had no such apparatus.

The DNA results found that the horse at Evergreen could well be by Dubai Excellence's sire, Highest Honor, but could not be out of Colorado Dancer, the dam of Dubai Excellence.