[1] La Tendresse was brought back to Europe and in September 1960 she was offered for sale at Doncaster where she was bought for 4,800 guineas by the Irish trainer Paddy Prendergast, acting on behalf of Pansy Parker Poe.
[2] Prendergast, who had built a reputation for handling precocious juveniles such as Windy City and Floribunda,[3] trained the filly at his stables at the Curragh, County Kildare.
At Goodwood Racecourse at the end of the month she was even more impressive when she was ridden by the Australian jockey Ron Hutchinson to win the Molecomb Stakes "in a canter"[2] by six lengths from Alpine Scent.
In the British Free Handicap for 1961, La Tendresse was the top-rated two-year-old of either sex, four pounds clear of her stable companion Display and six ahead of the leading colt Miralgo.
The independent Timeform organisation assigned La Tendresse a figure of 135, making the highest rated European two-year-old of either sex.