Promising Snitzel filly proves Ir-Resistible for Bell River
Raw Freedman-trained juvenile to aim up at Life Members Stakes at Eagle Farm with view to spring targets
Bell River Thoroughbreds’ Ferguson family are no strangers to racing quality fillies and they hope they have another one on their hands in the form of Resistible (Snitzel), a dominant first-start winner at Newcastle earlier this month.
A daughter of Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice), she was purchased for $270,000 at last year’s Magic Millions Yearling Sale – an auction at which Arrowfield’s champion sire averaged $453,556 while averaging $460,569 for the year – and James Ferguson believes Resistible has already ensured she has maintained her value with an important juvenile victory.
And if the Michael Freedman-trained two-year-old – a Gerry Harvey-bred half-sister Western Australian stakes winners Rebel King (Universal Ruler) and Rebelson (Snippetson) – can snare some black type in Saturday’s Tattersall’s Life Members Stakes (Listed, 1400m) at Eagle Farm, Bell River will have another highly commercial prospect to add to their boutique broodmare band in years to come.
First, though, is Resistible’s racetrack career, which Ferguson hopes can reach far greater heights than her impressive Newcastle maiden victory in the Australian Bloodstock Maiden Handicap (1200m).
In that race she crossed from the outside barrier, being challenged before responding to score a two and a quarter lengths victory.
“When we sent her away from the farm after a spell we thought if she got to the races that’d be great, but if not, so be it, because she’s quite an immature and raw filly,” Ferguson told ANZ Bloodstock News yesterday.
“What she did last week was all on natural ability, which is pretty exciting, because she’s not exactly bred to be a two-year-old, she’s got the pedigree to get over a mile and 2000 metres.
“Physically, she’s more of a three-year-old, so to get a win on the board at two with her pedigree, the job’s done now and it’s justified what we are trying to achieve by buying fillies or breeding fillies to keep and race.”
While there is little doubt about Resistible’s promise, Ferguson is not getting ahead of himself.
“If she happened to run top four on Saturday, it’s job done from a pedigree point of view, and it would also make things easier in terms of what races we target and what races we could get into in the spring,” he said.
“For three-year-old fillies over a mile and 2000 metres there’s plenty of options that would be right up her alley. We only won at Newcastle last week, but it is nice to be involved with her and it’s exciting at the same time.”
Bell River Thoroughbreds, after a brief hiatus from running a thoroughbred farm, relaunched at Dungog in the Lower Hunter Valley of NSW about four years ago. Since then, the Fergusons have acquired a small but enviable broodmare band, headlined by 2020’s The Galaxy (Gr 1, 1100m) winner I Am Excited (Snitzel) and fellow stakes-winning mares Prophet’s Thumb (I Am Invincible) and More Prophets (Smart Missile).
James Ferguson, along with his brother Jock and their father Andrew, are a feature at most yearling sales and are constantly on the lookout for potential fillies to buy, and the Snitzel filly out of the unraced Rebel Sister (Falbrav) at the 2021 Magic Millions sale was one who caught their attention.
Eighteen months on, they are more than comfortable with their decision to buy her from Harvey’s Baramul Stud for $270,000.
“We always do our research and look at the sales and we don’t always find something, but we do our research, do our work and when the opportunity presents itself then we’ll grab it and she was one that was,” he said.
“She is a big, raw filly and she is quite big for a Snitzel, too, but mechanically everything was there. There’s a lot of water to go under the bridge, but for what we paid for her with the pedigree that she’s got, she’s well and truly paid for herself now.
“Eventually, she’ll join the broodmare herd as a winning Snitzel two-year-old half to two stakes winners out of a half-sister to [six-time Group 1 winner] Black Heart Bart.”
Having sold a pinhooked Extreme Choice (Not A Single Doubt) colt for $775,000 at the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale in February, and a homebred filly by the same sire at the Inglis May Sale for $300,000, Ferguson is delighted with the way Bell River Thoroughbreds is developing.
“It is a long way from Wellington when I was a kid, when mum and dad started out breeding horses,” he reflected.
“We’ve only been back four years building it up. We’re not going to change anything, we’re going to keep doing what we’re doing because that seems to be what is working. What [mum] Georgie and [dad] Ferg built in ten years, we’ve been able to take hold of that and build in four and hopefully we can go bigger and stronger at the same time.”