Diamond could be vindication for Rosemont’s decision to reshape breeding and racing business
Win, lose or draw for Rosemont Stud, the fact it is connected to three runners in Victoria’s premier juvenile race today, the Blue Diamond Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m), is vindication enough that owner Nigel Austin and principal Anthony Mithen made the right call with its racing and breeding operation.
Rosemont Stud bred and co-owns exciting two-year-olds Rampant Lion (Frankel), Counttheheadlights (I Am Invincible) and Hafey (I Am Invincible), the latter a member of its Victorian Alliance colts syndicate, and the trio are all contenders in what many pundits consider to be an open renewal of the Group 1.
Cotton On founder Austin and his brother-in-law Mithen have been regulars at the Australian yearling sales as a vendor with Rosemont Stud, but the pair made a conscious decision to ramp up their operation’s racing division, which would see its red with white gatecrasher colours sported on more horses in Australia and overseas.
The early stages of that strategic investment – which could eventually see Rosemont compared to powerhouse Godolphin and its Australian predecessor, the Ingham family’s Woodlands Stud – is borne out in the Blue Diamond.
“It’s great vindication for the direction we decided to take in the past couple of years and that’s to have a more prominent representation in these nicer races,” Rosemont Stud’s general manager of bloodstock Ryan McEvoy said yesterday.
“It’s great credit to Anthony and Nigel who have been brave enough to take that path. We’re incredibly excited about having three Rosemont-connected horses in the Diamond. I think that’s a great achievement in itself.”
Rampant Lion, a Peter Moody-trained colt who ran third in the Maribyrnong Trial Stakes (Listed, 1000m) in October and resumed in the Blue Diamond Preview (C&G) (Listed, 1000m) to finish runner-up to Daumier (Epaulette) on January 26, underlines Rosemont’s willingness to think globally, breeding the exciting juvenile to southern hemisphere time.
After placing a big reserve on him at last year’s Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, Rosemont sold a portion of Rampant Lion to syndicator Wylie Dalziel. He is a $19 chance for the Blue Diamond.
“I think Rampant Lion is one of the most fascinating two-year-olds in work. He is a Frankel who is beautifully bred and he is doing things that are so unique to a Frankel,” McEvoy said.
“He wins his jump outs by big margins, he’s really got a speed profile and I know Peter and the stable think he’s a really exciting colt, a proper one.
“He is a live chance in an open field and, regardless of the result (today), I think he is a horse who we can follow into a Golden Rose-Caulfield Guineas prep in the spring. That is probably where he is going to be best suited to. He’s got such raw ability.”
Counttheheadlights (I Am Invincible) is out of Rosemont Stud-purchased mare Tahni Dancer (Sebring) ($600,000 in 2015), and Mithen and Austin agreed to remain in the Ciaron Maher and David Eustace-trained colt when selling him for $800,000 at the same Gold Coast sale where Rampant Lion was offered.
Making the perfect start to his racing career with a victory at Moonee Valley on January 22, Counttheheadlights ($16) ran fourth to Lofty Strike (Snitzel) in the Blue Diamond Prelude (C&G) (Gr 3, 1100m) last start.
“He is a lovely I Am Invincible colt who we bred and raised. We bought his mother, Tahni Dancer, and he’s an exciting horse,” McEvoy said.
“He’s a casual kind of colt, but he is going to put himself in the race and be there at the end.”
Thirdly, and arguably most importantly, is the Rosemont-led Victorian Alliance-owned colt Hafey ($16), an emphatic maiden winner at Bendigo on February 6 who has also made the Blue Diamond field after Maher and Eustace elected to take a low–key campaign into the Group 1.
“When Ciaron galloped Hafey the first time he described him as a pretty special sort of horse and he’s taken his time with him,” McEvoy said.
“The plan was very deliberate to go through a softer route and we feel that’s been of benefit to him.
“He’s really come out of that Bendigo maiden win feeling full of confidence and trained on. He’s a horse who we think, even post Saturday, has an enormous future. He’s such a good-looking horse with a great pedigree.”
The pedigree McEvoy references is US-bred, Grade 1-placed mare Beat The Benchmark (Speightstown) while his sire I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit) needs no introduction. The combination led the Victorian Alliance and agent Suman Hedge to pay $525,000 for him at last year’s Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale.
Rosemont Stud, meanwhile, has a draft of 18 yearlings – two of which are by resident sire Shamus Award (Snitzel) – that are set to go under the hammer at the Inglis Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale and it will continue to have a presence at bloodstock sales throughout Australasia well into the future.
However, any horse owned outright by Rosemont Stud is expected to be retained to race by Austin and Mithen, rather than putting them through a sales ring, while those in partnership will continue to be traded in a commercial manner as they have been in the past.