“I was $1,200 and the bloke who bought him went $1,250”
For more than 20 years, Peter and Peta Gray have been buying horses – on the cheap. They’ve never spent more than $3,000 on a horse, but they’ve sure bought plenty of them.
Over the past week-and-a-half, the Grays were the most prolific buyers at the Magic Millions on the Gold Coast, signing for 49 horses for $1,000 and $2,000 each.
Their activity is nothing new, but their names on the buyers’ sheet prompted multiple text messages and emails asking the same thing.
“Who are they?” the messages read.
In chatting to this column on Thursday, Peter Gray, a semi-retired auctioneer and property developer who resides on a 40-acre property near Beaudesert in South East Queensland, revealed that perhaps the most famous horse he’s ever had anything to do with was one that he, in fact, never bought.
Gray underbid Takeover Target (Celtic Swing), taxi driver-cum-trainer Joe Janiak’s 2003 sales ring punt of just $1,250. Of course, the broken down gelding-turned-champion sprinter took the then Queanbeyan-based Janiak around the world, winning 21 races and pocketing $6.3 million in the process for his battling cabbie-trainer.
“The one that got away was at the Sydney sales many years ago when Takeover Target came through. I was the losing bidder on him. I was $1,200 and the bloke who bought him went $1,250,” Gray recalls.
“I can still remember him [Janiak] there in his shorts and thongs and, at that stage, I probably had more money than him, but he’s surpassed me since.
“I was under the big fig tree there [at Newmarket]. He would have kept going, he knew the horse, and I thought, ‘what will I do with an unraced horse? I better stop’.”
Gray reckons he’s had 500 to 600 winners, mostly in outback Queensland, with trainers from his hometown of Beaudesert and nearby Warwick up to Townsville, Julia Creek and Mt Isa in Far North Queensland preparing his horses. He usually has 40 to 50 horses in work at any one time, not that he heads to the track often these days. “It’s a long drive home when you’ve got beaten,” he says.
Despite the “what could have been” with Takeover Target, he did have more luck with $1,000 buy Bobby Axelrod (Written Tycoon), who came out of the 2018 National Racehorse Sale session as an unraced horse. He went on to win 11 races and $152,000 from 57 career starts.
So, what does Gray actually want these sale ring “gifts” for? There’s a method to what some might suggest is madness.
“You’ve got to buy five to six to get the right one. We buy numbers and go through them and we try to buy mares as well because I’ve got a big contract to supply mares for embryo transplants,” Gray explains.
“They’re used to breed polo and polocrosse, campdrafting and stock horses. It’s a big industry now.”
Importantly, Gray stresses, he has a rehoming programme in place for the horses once their racing careers are finished. He also sells some young stock and leases out others.
***
There has been genuine domestic and international interest in buying Segenhoe Stud in the ten days since the renowned Hunter Valley farm was put on the market via an expression of interest process.
Segenhoe owner Kevin Maloney bought Segenhoe Stud in 2010 and he has since increased the landholding to 567 hectares and made numerous infrastructure improvements to the sought after farm known for producing a string of elite race horses.
Selling agent Clint Donovans says he’s had several requests for inspections and information from interested parties since ANZ Bloodstock News revealed Maloney’s intentions on May 28.
“People realise the opportunity to purchase the property. I haven’t had anyone tell me it’s not the best farm in the Hunter Valley and the ability for someone to pick up the brand and carry it forward isn’t lost on people,” Donovan told us on Thursday.
“I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the amount of genuine interest … so I think we’re sitting in a pretty healthy position as far as finding a new owner goes.”
The property is being offered for sale by Magic Millions, Sotheby’s and Donovan & Co through an expression of interest process which closes on July 4.
Donovan is also hopeful of selling the Hutchins family’s Element Hill properties in South East Queensland. Expressions of interest close today.
However, it’s not good news for well-known NSW breeder Ian Smith whose sale of Edinburgh Park on the state’s mid-north coast has fallen through after a brewhouse bought it at auction with plans to make it a hospitality venue and tourist attraction.
Smith dispersed his bloodstock interests at the 2023 Magic Millions National sale.
***
In this column last week Widden’s Antony Thompson was all for Magic Millions’ new National sale format, with the two-day weanling sale leading straight into three days of mares sales, from Sunday to Thursday.
Magic Millions boss Barry Bowditch remains comfortable with the scheduling but he won’t rule out changes for next year’s National sale.
“At this point, yes, I am [satisfied], but as always, you consult your key stakeholders to make sure you’re making the right decisions for the industry,” he said at the conclusion of the National Yearling Sale on Wednesday.
“The right decisions are always around what’s best for the horses and what way we can get the most buyers to participate in the marketplace.”
***
David Moodie has made many astute decisions during his business and racing life – and it appears he may have made another by supporting Darley shuttler Too Darn Hot (Dubawi).
The star stallion, who is making waves in both hemispheres, sired his 11th individual first crop winner at Geelong on Thursday.
“I went long on Too Darn Hot. I’ve got more yearlings by Too Darn Hot than what Godolphin have got,” he told us.
The fact that Moodie has a breed-to-race mentality means he doesn’t have to get caught up in the commercialisation of the industry when it doesn’t suit him.
He said: “I’m not in the business any more of paying what I view to be inflated service fees.”
Moodie has already enjoyed success with a son of fellow Darley shuttler Blue Point (Shamardal), the Mat Ellerton-trained Blue Renegade who won at Sandown in May, while Symphony Of Colour (Shamus Award) won on debut in April and finished runner-up in the $1 million VOBIS Showdown (1200m).
The filly, incidentally, is out of Nediym’s Glow (General Nediym), the grand dam of Moodie’s recently retired stallion General Beau (Brazen Beau) who, as reported in this edition of ANZ, will stand under the Maluka Thoroughbreds banner at Breeders Farm in Victoria. Symphony Of Colour ran fourth in the David Coles Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) on May 11 before being spelled.
***
Roger Langley retired from the board of Thoroughbred Breeders Victoria after a long tenure and, in doing so, retold his involvement with Nathan Tinkler, the mining millionaire who left a trail of destruction, mostly financial, in his wake as Patinack Farm went bust.
Langley says it soon became apparent Tinkler’s reckless spending on horses was akin to a gambling addiction.
“In about 2006, I met Nathan Tinkler. He rang me to get some advice on service fees for his mares and we ended up having a few long chats. He said to me, ‘would you help buy me some weanlings?’ So I met him in Sydney at the weanling sales and I think we ended up buying about 25 weanlings. That was my first insight into his compulsive nature for buying horses,” Langley said.
“I consulted with Tinkler for a couple of years, putting forward a plan and a direction for Patinack Farm. Sadly, that all fell apart in the first year. I suggested that he buy 25, maybe 30 yearlings and give those to several trainers so that he could find the trainers that he preferred to work with.
“In the meantime he could look at locations, farms and start to buy some quality broodmares and possibly a stallion if the opportunity arose.
“But that plan went out of the window. We ended up with 300 yearlings, two farms, 200 broodmares, five stallions and it just went through the roof. There was no system in place and no capability of really tracking all of the yearlings and mares.
“It was 2008 and he literally saved the yearling market that year. He was on the phone to me at the sales saying ‘just buy’ this horse, I want it. We bought three $2.4 million yearlings; we bought a three-quarter brother to Dance Hero and a three-quarter brother to Casino Prince and Alinghi’s full-brother. Out of the 300 yearlings, I think there were five Group 1 winners.”
Langley left Tinkler and Patinack less than two years into its existence.
“It was an interesting time and Nathan gave me a great opportunity – I got to know a lot of people around the world in the racing industry,” Langley said.
“It gave me a great insight into the global industry.”
Langley was on the TBV board for 16 years.