In August 2020, French-based stallion Wootton Bassett was purchased by Coolmore to stand at their Irish facility. The purchase price was never made public, but there is little doubt that Coolmore were more than satisfied with their decision after his first crop of Irish-conceived juveniles hit the track last year, and if they were satisfied then, they must be positively ecstatic following that crop's sensational start to 2025.
The catalyst behind Wootton Bassett's acquisition is the meteoric rise from the bargain basement—his fee was as low as €4,000 (US$4,550.11; €1 = US$1.14) in his third and fourth years—to a position as one of Europe's elite sires. That low fee would have been hard to predict at the end of Wootton Bassett's first season, after a campaign that saw him rated as champion 2-year-old male in France with five starts bringing five wins, among them the the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere Grand Criterium (G1), and a pair of valuable sales races. At 3, however, Wootton Bassett failed to hit the board and retired to stud the following year at Haras d'Etreham near Normandy, France, at a fee of €6,000.
Even at that, the son of Iffraaj (by the Gone West stallion Zafonic) was largely scorned by local breeders, and he had only 23 foals in his first crop and 18 in his second. One of that first crop, though, was 2016 European champion 3-year-old male Almanzor, winner of that year's Champion Stakes (G1), Irish Champion Stakes (G1), and Prix du Jockey Club (French Derby, G1). The high-class winners continued to come over the next few years, and to date, Wootton Bassett's French-conceived crops have yielded 414 starters, and 46 stakes winners, among them additional group and grade 1 winners Audarya, Al Riffa, Royal Patronage, Bucanero Fuerte, King of Steel, Wooded, Zellie, Unquestionable, and Incarville.
Wootton Bassett's first Coolmore crop—conceived at a fee of €100,000, which rose to €300,000 for the current season—has already produced 17 stakes winners, including this weekend's Prix du Jockey winner Camille Pissarro; Henri Matisse, who had Camille Pissarro back in third when capturing the Prix de Poule d'Essai des Poulains (French Two Thousand Guineas, G1); other group 1 winners Tennessee Stud (who will challenge for the Epsom Derby (G1) June 7) and Twain; and a further nine group winners, among them Juwelier, who took the Baden-Baden Derby Trial (G3) on the same day as Camille Pissarro's triumph, and Whirl, who will be among favorites for the Epsom Oaks (G1) June 6. Another member of the crop, Detain, has yet to win a black-type event but was third only three-quarters of a length behind Camille Pissarro in the Prix du Jockey Club.
Coolmore have also shuttled Wootton Bassett to Australia, where his first crop are currently 2-year-olds. He doesn't yet have a stakes winner from that crop, but six of his juveniles have earned black type, including Wodeton, beaten just a head in Australia's premier juvenile contest, the ATC Golden Slipper (G1), and the ATC Sires' Produce Stakes (G1) second, State Visit, and he sits third on the leading sires of 2-year-olds table
Camille Pissarro's dam, Entreat, a half sister to group winner Producer, won a 1 3/16-mile maiden race at Folkestone in eight starts. In 2016, when she had four foals on the ground, three of which had started, and one of which had won, Entreat, was sold for 14,000 guineas at the Tattersalls July Sale. The foal she had on the ground at the time, the Dutch Art filly Exhort, was to earn black type with a win in the 2019 Pipalong Stakes. Even better, the Lethal Force colt she was carrying turned out to be Golden Horde, by far the best runner to represent his sire, and winner of the 2020 Commonwealth Cup (G1) and 2019 Richmond Stakes (G2). The next year, came the Mehmas gelding Line of Departure, successful in the 2021 Cathedral Stakes at Salisbury.
The two foals following Line of Departure were only minor winners, but then came Camille Pissarro. A 1.25 million-guinea Tattersalls October yearling, Camille Pissarro had a busy seven-race juvenile season, and one that saw him campaigned for much of the year as if he was expected to be a speedster in the mold of Golden Horde, rather than a classic middle-distance horse. In action as early as April, he debuted with a stylish six-furlong maiden win at Navan. Beaten a head in the Marble Hill Stakes (G3), he faded to eleventh in a 22-horse field for the Coventry Stakes (G2) at Royal Ascot, after showing early speed from an unfavorable draw. Second in the Angelsey Stakes (G3) over 6 1/2 furlongs, Camille Pissarro was never able to get involved in Gimcrack Stakes (G2) over a half a furlong shorter, finishing sixth of 10.
Beaten just a nose in a valuable 6 1/2-furlong sales stakes at Doncaster, Camille Pissaro ended the year with a first black-type triumph, taking the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere by a neck over his Coventry stakes conqueror Rashabar, with Henri Matisse back in fifth. He opened his 2025 campaign with a running-on second, beaten a half-length by the older horse, Big Gossey, in the Gladness Stakes, and then prepped for the Prix du Jockey Club with a third beaten 1 1/4 lengths by stable companion Henri Matisse in the Poule d'Essai.
Camille Pissarro's granddam, the Irish River mare River Saint, is half sister to a real celebrity in the form of Serena's Song, United States champion 3-year-old filly in 1995 and subsequently dam of group 1 winner Sophisticat, and group winners Harlington, Grand Reward, and Schramsberg. Imagining, the dam of River Saint and Serena's Song, appears in the female line of a total of 42 stakes winners, including 2013 champion Irish 2-year-old filly Rizeena (by Wootton Bassett's sire, Iffraaj) and other group/grade 1 winners Field of Gold, an impressive winner of this year's Irish Two Thousand Guineas (G1); Honor Code, the champion older horse of 2015; and Zabeel Prince.
Camille Pissarro and Henri Matisse are two of 10 starters for Wootton Bassett out of mares by Pivotal, a mating that gives a 4x4 duplication of Pivotal's grandsire, Nureyev, a factor that could them him an interesting cross for the legion of Galileo (by Nureyev's close relation Sadler's Wells) which will await if they retire to Coolmore, Wootton Bassett having already sired eight group/graded winners out of Galileo mares. This is all the more so in the case of Camille Pissarro, whose dam is a Northern Dancer/Never Bend cross, a combination that has similarities to the cross of Northern Dancer over a mare by Never Bend's half brother, Bold Reason, that produced Sadler's Wells.
