‘Ozzmosis is one of the most important stallion prospects of the past five years’
Zoustar colt’s lineage makes him a valuable member of the Australian Stud Book
Henry Field was on his way to America for the country’s premier breeding stock sales yesterday, leaving him little time to toast the Coolmore Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) success of Ozzmosis (Zoustar), a colt he considers to be one of the most important to emerge in the past five years.
The premier three-year-old race of the spring, and arguably the season, proved another defining moment for Field and his Newgate Farm empire when Ozzmosis, a colt the studmaster and his partners bought into in mid-June, instantly became a headline stallion prospect with his victory in the time-honoured Group 1.
Trainer Bjorn Baker on Saturday, in the afterglow of Ozzmosis’ stunning success, labelled it as a life-changing moment for him, an expatriate New Zealander, and no doubt for many of the colt’s initial Darby Racing syndicate of owners.
Field was elated that Ozzmosis’ CV had been dramatically upgraded, further adding to Newgate’s stallion power alongside fellow stud-owned gun three-year-olds Militarize (Dundeel) and King’s Gambit (I Am Invincible), the latter was forced to forgo his shot in the Coolmore after he returned an elevated temperature on the eve of the Group 1.
What was already a multimillion dollar deal became significantly higher upon Ozzmosis’ show of sustained speed on the weekend, the initial owners receiving a kicker payment for the colt’s Group 1 win.
“We struck a deal near the end of his two-year-old season when he was lightly raced, before he won a stakes race and they got a great opportunity to get a seven-figure sum of money off the table and de-risk a bit and we were able to buy a stake in the horse,” Field told ANZ Bloodstock News at Sydney airport as he prepared to board a flight to Lexington, Kentucky, for the Fasig-Tipton and Keeneland November Breeding Stock sales.
“The deal was structured with bonuses, it was a robust position, but we did buy into one of the really important stallion prospects of the past five years when you look at the fact Encosta De Lago, Northern Meteor, Zoustar and now Ozzmosis are four horses who have a very similar make-up, have similar race form, all winners of the Coolmore.
“His father, grandfather and great grandfather are really important pages in the Stud Book and we feel confident that he will be too.”
Ozzmosis’ sire, Widden Stud’s flagbearer Zoustar, won the race in 2013, with his grand sire Northern Meteor having taken it out five years earlier. Northern Meteor’s sire, champion Encosta De Lago (Fairy King), started the dynasty by winning it in 1996 when the Flemington feature was known as the Ascot Vale Stakes and run at Group 2 level.
Scott Darby has enjoyed some enormous highs through the deeds of dual Group 1 winner Yankee Rose (All American) and 2017 Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m) winner She Will Reign (Manhattan Rain), but he said Ozzmosis is rapidly closing the gap on the two star fillies such is the enormity and importance of the colt’s signature win on Saturday.
“I still probably hold those two as our pinnacle, but I see him overtaking those as our best horse very soon,” Darby told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“It was a huge race to win, particularly from a colt’s point of view, and our team have really focused on buying a higher end colt but still within our AFS licence of a cap of $500,000 fully syndicated.
“We’ve been doing that for a number of years, but it’s not easy. Most of them get gelded, but he was one that we targeted and it’s an absolute thrill for the team and the owners.”
Darby recalled how he, Mark Holland and Loren Wadsworth identified the China Horse Club-bred and Sledmere Stud-sold Ozzmosis as a yearling at the Magic Millions sale on the Gold Coast in January 2022.
“Because we’ve only got a certain amount of money, most of the time you’re getting beaten by those bigger colts’ groups. So we said, ‘let’s go for these better pedigrees and better stallions and if we’ve got to sacrifice maturity or something like that, that’s where we’ll get our saving’ and that’s exactly what he was,” Darby said.
“He was a lovely style of colt, very athletic, but he probably wasn’t your typical Magic Millions style of horse and it was in the Covid year.”
As it happened, Darby tested positive to Covid on day one of inspections, forcing him to be confined to a hotel room and he left it to Holland and Wadsworth to be his eyes and ears on the grounds at the Gold Coast.
“I remember clearly when we got to his number on our list – we’d been blown out of the water on a number of them – we had $150,000-$200,000 marked for him,” he said.
“I rang Mark and I said, ‘this is the one we’re going to go hard on. I am sick of getting beaten.
“We might have gone to $350,000, but in Covid back then $250,000 [his eventual price] was top and we sort of blew the budget.”
After winning both starts as a two-year-old, Ozzmosis made this perfect start to his three-year-old season when taking out the Heritage Stakes (Listed, 1100m) at Rosehill first-up on September 23 .
Ozzmosis’ colours were lowered by King’s Gambit in the Roman Consul Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m) four weeks before the Coolmore, but Baker and Darby never lost faith in their star colt and their confidence was only heightened after a Flemington jump-out eight days out from the Group 1.
“Hindsight’s wonderful and he didn’t parade well first-up in the Heritage. He only had the one trial and he just went in a bit underdone and paraded accordingly, but he got away with it on ability,” Darby said.
“Sometimes when they don’t parade well, a lot of the good judges say second up they can run poorly or not up to their ability.
“Looking back, even before winning yesterday, we were extremely confident that this horse had come on in leaps and bounds.”
As for King’s Gambit, who was denied his chance of a Group 1 win, Field said: “It was devastating 24 hours earlier to have to scratch the horse we believed could win the race. He is obviously a horse with so much incredible natural ability. But racing’s got a funny way of working its way through and we were just so pleased to be part of Ozzmosis and to see him win for a wonderful group of owners he’s got.”
With a young stallion roster at Newgate Farm and at least three more set to join the Hunter Valley stud’s ranks in the next year or two, America has become an important source of outcross bloodlines for Field and his co-investors.
“We have had great success buying mares that have been really important to Newgate. A lot of the very good horses off the farm have come out of these American mares,” Field said.
“We obviously also bought Con Te Partiro out of there and won a couple of Group 1s with her and traded her for a significant premium compared to what we paid for her, so it’s been a happy hunting ground for us and we’ll be working very hard to try and find some young mares to go Ozzmosis, King’s Gambit and Militarize.”