Champagne flows after Madame Pommery realises $2.7 million
The 2022 Thousand Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) winner Madame Pommery (No Nay Never) will also be covered in her first season at stud by Wootton Bassett who has been a revelation in Europe from humble beginnings. His first crop southern hemisphere-bred yearlings will race next season.
The now retired Madame Pommery, who won at two and was also twice placed at Group 2 level during her 18-start career, was a $150,000 purchase by her trainer Chris Waller and agent Guy Mulcaster at the 2021 Magic Millions Yearling Sale for a women’s only syndicate put together by the trainer’s client relations manager Sophie Baker.
Such was the nervous anticipation ahead of the selling of Madame Pommery, Baker was unable to watch the sales ring theatre unfold, revealing: “I haven’t been able to to watch her for about half an hour”.
“We’ve got so many loyal supporters behind us. They paid $150,000, she’s won a Group 1, she’s won $800,000 and she’s done this today [Tuesday]. It’s unbelievable,” an emotional Baker said after Madame Pommery fetched $2.7 million.
“They’ve all had a great time, now they’re great friends, they’ve had a few champagnes – especially a lot of Pommery – and they’ll be celebrating tonight.”
The rising five-year-old mare is a daughter of two-time winner Cancel (Exceed And Excel), the sister to the Blue Diamond (Gr 1, 1200m)-winning champion two-year-old Earthquake, which makes her a half-sister to the New Zealand Group 3-placed Moet Down (Pierro).
Hailing from a deep Godolphin-developed pedigree, Madame Pommery’s pedigree also features stakes winners Pandemic (Sepoy), Palomares (Commands) and the black type-placed Sumatra (Lonhro), Namazu (Medaglia d’Oro) and this season’s stakes-placed juvenile Trembles (Too Darn Hot).
“She’s a lovely mare, we’ve obviously got a lot of No Nay Never fillies at home and they’re good producers,” Magnier said.
“She was an unbelievable race filly, Chris Waller did a great job and Sophie Baker is a big help to our team and she’s a superstar and I was delighted for her and all her connections.”
Five lots earlier, Coolmore partnered with Victorian breeder Rob McClure to buy Rosemont Stud’s stakes-winning juvenile Legacies (Justify) as a racing and breeding proposition for $1.4 million.
The rising four-year-old mare, who is in training with Peter Moody and Katherine Coleman, could tackle the Tatt’s Tiara (Gr 1, 1400m) at Eagle Farm in late June.
“I’ve never had such belief in a stallion like I have in Justify. That is well known,” Coolmore confidant James Bester said.
“She was a beauty. She has a great head, a fabulous hip on her and the most awesome action. She just glided across the ground. She has a huge overstep reaching out in front, quite my idea of the best physical specimen at the sale.”
Legacies was raced by Rosemont Stud’s Anthony Mithen and his brother-in-law and Cotton On founder Nigel Austin, the latter being able to claim the credit for breeding the exciting Anzac Day Stakes (Listed, 1400m) winner who won twice this preparation.
“All credit to my brother-in-law who is very good at selling clothes but also very good at mating mares to Justify because it was his mating that held sway,” Mithen said.
“He loved the stallion and we sent the mare and decided to race her, two Justify fillies out of that crop with the other one Everlasting Kiss who is with Trent Busuttin.
“We wanted to back the stallion in a bit and it is nice to get that sort of return and that sort of a result.”
Mithen and Bester both believe Legacies has a lot of racing upside left in her if the new partners elected to keep her in training next season.
“Whether or not that’ll happen, Coolmore and Robert McLure will decide,” Bester said.
“But it is not insignificant to us that each time she won, the horse she beat came out and won a Group race. All the way from her maiden race onwards.
“She’s beaten a number of Group 1 winners along the way. We consider her that class of filly.”
Mithen admitted to becoming slightly exasperated with constant questions about why Rosemont was selling Legacies and a number of other highly commercial mares this week.
“It is a business. It is not just a collectors’ market. We’ve got to make sure we are a viable vendor for those looking to buy good bloodstock,” he said.
“This was a bit of a flag in the ground to say, ‘we’re not just collecting bloodstock, we’re here to trade bloodstock.’
“We like to think that we breed a good product and the way you get a return is to put them back through the ring and let other people enjoy that product as well.”
Bester isn’t afraid to spruik a stallion, but he’s also put his money where his mouth is, revealing that he currently has ten mares in foal to the supersire.
Justify will not return to Coolmore Australia for the 2024 breeding season, instead covering a select group of mares to southern hemisphere time at Ashford Stud in Kentucky later this year.
The Coolmore splurge came just weeks after the international outfit spent $6.7 million on bluechip mares She’s Extreme (Extreme Choice) ($3.4 million), C’Est Magique (Zoustar) ($1.7 million) and Autumn Ballet (The Autumn Sun) ($1.6 million) at the Inglis’ Chairman’s Sale.