Odeum’s owners make late bid for mother and sister of Toronado stakes winner Shelby Cobra
Mills sets Inglis Digital broodmare record after paying $325,000 for two-in-one package
The syndicate behind Thousand Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) winner Odeum (Written Tycoon) have swooped on a valuable two-in-one mare and foal package which gained a significant pedigree update a day after bidding in an online auction had started.
Victorian agent Sheamus Mills yesterday combined with loyal clients Heath Newton and Anthony Roberts to secure Segenhoe Valley (Dane Shadow), who has a filly foal at foot by Swettenham Stud shuttler Toronado (High Chaparral), for $325,000 in the Inglis Digital November (Early) Online Auction.
The filly’s three-year-old brother Shelby Cobra, one of two stakes winners at Flemington for Toronado on Saturday, won the Springtime Stakes (Listed, 1400m) at just his third start for trainer Mike Moroney.
Mills was impressed by the manner of Shelby Cobra’s victory, but it was only earlier this week when he thought the mare and foal deserved strong consideration,
“Funnily enough, I only spotted the horse and started to pay attention to her on Tuesday after I saw the ad in the ANZ, so you can say that the full-page ad worked there,” Mills told ANZ Bloodstock News last night.
“I had seen her mentioned, but the ad twigged a memory. I rang Russell Osborne to ask if I could go and have a look. I did the run to Riverbank Farm at Benalla today and inspected her. I liked her, so I spoke to my clients and we had a bid.”
The Newton, Mills and Roberts partnership enjoyed Group 1 success last month with the Mick Price and Mick Kent Jr-trained Odeum, who was spelled after her narrow defeat in the Empire Rose Stakes (Gr 1, 1600m) on Derby Day at Flemington to become number one seed in the group’s select group of quality race fillies and broodmares.
Mills is confident that Segenhoe Valley and her foal will prove to be a well-bought addition to the group’s bloodstock portfolio.
“You pick up any catalogue and look at 1000 mares, how many of them will produce a stakes horse in their first three foals?” he pondered.
“I don’t know the answer to that question but I am tipping it is less than five per cent. I think what this mare has done needs to be recognised.
“When you start to think about it more, we go to the yearling sales and spend $300,000 to $400,000 trying to buy a nice yearling. With this, you have essentially bought the foal and you have got mum as well.
“If I went to the sales and said to Newhaven Park’s John Kelly that we want Odeum and Odeum’s mum for $400,000, you would get laughed off the place. I said to the boys, ‘it’s the time of year and the situation that we’re all in, maybe the true value of this horse won’t get recognised’ and personally I think that’s the case.”
Segenhoe Valley’s dam Scone (Zabeel) is from a potent and current family with the likes of Listed winner Roulettes (Flying Spur) and her offspring Sun City (Zoustar) and Parlophone (I Am Invincible), as well as talented stakes-winning sprinter Vezalay (Shamardal), out of Tactfully (Flying Spur), herself Group-placed.
Mills will have Segenhoe Valley vetted this morning in the hope that she could be mated with an as-yet undecided stallion, while he is delighted with what he saw when inspecting the mare and her three-week-old foal.
“I love this family. I’d say I have clients who have three or four mares from that family,” he said.
“There’s Parlophone and Vezalay and, the thing about it is, in another year or two you will be struggling to fit the stakes winners on the page. It’s that depth of pedigree that had me interested.”
Segenhoe Valley is the second highest-priced lot sold through an Inglis Digital sale and the most expensive broodmare to be put through the virtual marketplace. Stakes-winning race mare Manaya (Hinchinbrook) holds the company record at $400,000 after being sold in the July 2019 auction.
Segenhoe Valley, who raced three times for two placings including a first-start second at Newcastle as a two-year-old for Gerry Harvey, was sold for just $5000 to Queensland hobby breeder Laurelle Owen at the 2018 Inglis Great Southern Sale when she was in foal to Starcraft (Soviet Star). The now unraced two-year-old colt has been named Star Acclaim while she missed in 2018 before heading to Toronado last year.
“The only reason I bought this mare is because I saw Shelby Cobra go through as a weanling at the same sale for $70,000 to Maluka Thoroughbreds,” Owen said.
“I’ve been following Shelby Cobra, I saw him make $130,000 at last year’s Inglis Premier Sale and started receiving reports that he was showing lots of promise in the stable, so I rang Russell Osborne at Riverbank and told him I wanted to send the dam to Toronado and everything since has just fallen into place.
“It’s a credit to Russell and Caroline Osborne at Riverbank Farm, they’ve done a fabulous job looking after my girls then ensuring we got the right certificates completed to upload to this mare’s listing, plus videos and photographs completed (by Digital Media Creations).”