Grade 1 winner Unbridled Belle dead after foaling complications

Grade 1 winner and millionaire Unbridled Belle died in February in Japan after foaling complications, Kate Hunter, a communications manager in the Japanese bloodstock industry, confirmed.

The 11-year-old Broken Vow mare was purchased by Haruya Yoshida’s Oiwake Farm for $400,000 at the Keeneland January horses of all ages sale earlier this year. She died from foaling complications while in quarantine Feb. 17, two days after delivering a Bernardini foal. The foal also died.

A minor stakes winner at 3, Unbridled Belle blossomed as an older mare, winning the Grade 1 Beldame Stakes and Grade 2 Delaware Handicap, the latter by 7 3/4 lengths, in 2007. The field she defeated in the Beldame included eventual Eclipse Award champion Ginger Punch and multiple Grade 1 winner Balance. Unbridled Belle went on to win the following season’s Grade 3 Obeah Stakes, a race she again won in 2009, along with the Grade 3 Turnback the Alarm Handicap, and was second in the Beldame. She placed in seven other stakes, including three Grade 1 events, and concluded her career with eight wins from 25 starts and earnings of $1,909,823.

Unbridled Belle produced a 3-year-old Medaglia d'Oro filly, Love d'Oro, who resides in Ireland; and a 2-year-old Distorted Humor filly, Ma Belle Amore, who resides in Russia.