Speedy Hong Kong-bound Super One colt stars at Inglis Ready2Race Sale
$400,000 top price as buyers gravitate to middle and high-end of two-year-old market
A domestic buying bench featuring some new and arguably unexpected names prepared to invest heavily at the top-end of the market helped underpin yesterday’s record-breaking Inglis Ready2Race Sale in Sydney, another example of the thirst for Australian bloodstock.
The honour of the top-priced lot went to a more traditional jurisdiction for two-year-old sale buyers, after a prominent Hong Kong owner went to $400,000 for a colt by Super One (I Am Invincible), that in turn stole the limelight from juveniles by Coolmore’s Pierro (Lonhro) and Newgate Farm’s sire sensation Capitalist (Written Tycoon), three of 17 lots to make $200,000 or more.
Despite Super One not deemed as commercially popular as the aforementioned pair, the colt’s breeze-up in Queensland did not go unnoticed by a large number of experienced buyers, leading to the intense competition for the Symphony Lodge-consigned horse.
He ran the fastest time of the morning at Eagle Farm on the dirt track, recording a sizzling 10.03 seconds for his 200-metre hit-out.
Cheng Keung Fai, the owner of Hong Kong’s champion four-time Group 1 winner Designs On Rome (Holy Roman Emperor), won the spirited duel with a big-price tag expected from the outset when an opening $200,000 bid received from the Riverside Stables floor set the platform for the sale-topping colt.
Symphony Lodge is run by Matt and Alison Park from Oakey in Queensland and they were forced to take a hands-off approach during the sale, instead watching the action unfold online due to the closure of the state border.
Topping the sale was due recognition for the Super One colt, according to Alison Park, who admitted the achievement had exceeded her high expectations.
“It was amazing, but at the end of the day he breezed up quickly. He’s a quick horse, big and scopey and he wasn’t pushed, he did it all so naturally, so he deserved to sell well,” she said.
“Super One is great for the overseas market, but he probably hasn’t had the runners here yet to get that same recognition, so we never really knew how the horse would sell, so to top the sale, wow, it really is amazing.
“I thought we’d get $200,000 to $250,000, especially after the X-ray hits, which were big. He was busy during parades, but $400,000? No way.”
Bought by Golden River Investments for $55,000 from the Edinglassie Thoroughbreds draft at this year’s Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, the colt is by the same sire as Hong Kong cult horse Gluck Racer, a winner of three races for owner Lau Kwai Ching and trainer Manfred Man and, more recently, Jimmy Ting.
Catalogued as Lot 137, he is the fifth living foal out of the unraced Cash First (Exceed And Excel), herself a sister to High Achiever, the dam of Group 3 winner She’s So High (I Am Invincible). Another half-sister Madoni (Lonhro) is the dam of stakes-winning juvenile Mockery (Verrazano).
Further back, the colt’s third dam, Announce (Military Plume), produced Listed winner Listen Here (Elusive Quality) – the dam of Group 1 winner and now Darley Stud resident Shooting To Win (Northern Meteor) and his Group 2-scoring brother Deep Field, who stands at Newgate Farm.
Super One, who started his stud career at Newgate Farm, is standing this season at Newhaven Park at a fee of $15,000 (plus GST).
Turner takes star pair home to Warwick Farm
Sydney trainer Amanda Turner’s goal of being a regular on the main stage received a big boost when she spent $740,000 on a pair of two-year-olds at the Inglis sale yesterday and she hopes they can measure up in major races as soon as the autumn carnival.
Turner’s first move was to outlay $370,000 for a gelding by Capitalist before later adding a Pierro colt for the same price later on in the afternoon. Both horses will go immediately into work at her Warwick Farm stables, with the trainer in no mood to waste time as she attempts to get a return on the high-priced juveniles.
The $2 million Inglis Millennium (RL, 1100m) could be on the radar for the Blake Ryan Racing-prepared Capitalist juvenile who showed his potential when clocking an eye-catching 10.13-second breeze-up at Hawkesbury last month.
“He was the one I was after. I really liked him. He’s a very athletic horse. I spoke to Blake as well. He’s sad to lose the horse, as he’s done everything with him, but he got a good price for him and I believe he’s worth every cent of it,” Turner said.
“You can see that he should be ready to go to the races shortly and, as Blake said, he’s had a nice spell now and he’ll go into the stables and start work straight away.”
Offered as Lot 40, the gelding was purchased by JGR Bloodstock for $85,000 from the Fairview Park Stud draft at this year’s Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale.
He is the third foal out of the US Grade 3-winning mare Orchestrator (Bernstein).
“We have spent a hell of a lot of money in New Zealand (on two-year-olds). At one stage we were probably spending $700,000 (a year) … We’re trying to get better quality and I think this horse will just be perfect for us,” Turner said.
“I was getting a bit edgy to start with because I thought he might go for $260,000, $270,000 but when he went for more I decided that I really wanted him and I am glad I did. It’s a good feeling.
“I am hoping someone will pick up the phone after this and want to be part of the stable.”
Ryan was delighted with the result and he said the gelding had exceeded his expectations when breezing him up last month.
“He was a great horse to work with all the way through. We had a reserve of $200,000 on him and more than exceeded that and we couldn’t be happier,” said Ryan, who was celebrating his best result as a consignor.
“He’s gone to a great home in Amanda’s. She’s underrated, she buys a nice horse and does a good job with them, so I know he will be well looked after. He paraded well all week and his vetting, numbers wise, was through the roof.
“I always had a good opinion of him but his breeze-up was the day I thought, ‘wow’. It was the first time I’d really let him off the chain, which is what I’d done with all of mine. The quickest I ask them to go is on the (breeze-up) day and he exploded.
“It took me back and bit and I thought, ‘we might have a fair dinkum one here’.”
Meanwhile, Turner’s Pierro colt, who breezed up in 10.83 seconds in New Zealand for vendor Cheltenham Stables, is the first foal out of the winning I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit) mare Ajeeta, who is a half-sister to the Group 3-placed Axe (Written Tycoon).
“I had the Pierro on my list … but I thought no, then once I saw him (in the flesh) I thought I’d do my best to get him.
“He doesn’t look like he is sick of it, even here at the sale. He looks like he is ready to go on with and he should be ready to go straight into work. He is a nice horse.”
Blake Ryan Racing was the second leading vendor, selling 12 of his 16 two-year-olds on offer for an aggregate of $1,448,000 at an average of $120,667. Ryan’s strong day’s trade included a $220,000 colt by Flying Artie (Artie Schiller), a remarkable pinhook result after being purchased for just $20,000 at the Inglis May Yearling Sale by Inglis managing director Mark Webster for his brother-in-law Craig Blight.
He was bought yesterday by trainers Richard and Michael Freedman in conjunction with Andrew Williams Bloodstock. Catalogued as Lot 90, he is the first foal out of Stryking Debut (Stryker) who is a half-sister to Group 3-winning stayer Bondeiger (War Pass). He breezed up in 10.50 seconds at Hawkesbury.
“I would love to lay claim to buying him (the Flying Artie colt) as a yearling. The client’s done an amazing job. I am pretty sure they stole him here at the May Sale. He’s flourished in work and he’s a beautiful moving horse,” Ryan said.
“He galloped out really well and it took me right around to the 1000-metre mark (at Hawkesbury) to pull him up. He just eats his feed, does his work and gets around the place without a fuss.”
Hong Kong takes shine to Deep Field colt
The fourth-highest-priced lot of yesterday’s sale was a son of Newgate Farm’s Deep Field (Northern Meteor) and, unsurprisingly, he will end up in Hong Kong after being purchased for $360,000 by owner Yip Wai Kwan.
Deep Field is the sire of 12 individual winners of 31 races in Hong Kong to date, including headliners Sky Field, Wishful Thinker, My Sugar and Californiadeepshot.
The colt, a $150,000 purchase by Group 1 Goldmine at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, breezed up for Glenn Haven Thoroughbreds’ Matt Vella in a time of 10.34 seconds.
Catalogued as Lot 56, he is out of the Red Ransom (Roberto) mare Red Hot Chillies, a half-sister to the stakes-placed Privlaka (Mossman).
“I thought he was the best horse in the sale. Maybe I am a bit biased, but he sold well at $360,000. We had him for sale at $200,000 knowing he’d bring a lot more than that.
“He’s quality, so whoever races him will have a lot of fun. He’s all quality, he’s got the pedigree, he’s got the build, he’s the attitude.
“I’d be very surprised if he didn’t make a good career for himself.”
Glenn Haven Thoroughbreds finished the day as the leading vendor by aggregate, selling 11 two-year-olds for a gross of $2.04 million at an average of $185,455, bringing down the curtain for Vella’s association with Sir Owen Glenn.
But Vella, who has recently joined the powerful Annabel Neasham stable, won’t be lost to the breeze-up market.
He said: “The plan is to keep having a go, Annabel has told me that I can keep doing it. It was part of the contract, you could say. I will definitely keep doing it.”
Champion Hong Kong trainer Ricky Yiu also made his presence felt when he teamed up with Australia-based Dean Hawkes for a colt by Coolmore’s Golden Slipper Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m)-winning stallion Vancouver (Medaglia d’Oro) for $320,000.
Offered by Glenn Haven Racing as Lot 48, the $120,000 Inglis Premier graduate, who was selected by Paul Moroney as a yearling, is out of Purity (Ferocity), a half-sister to 1996 Golden Slipper-winning filly Merlene (Danehill) and fellow Group 1 winner Miss Pennymoney (Brocco). He was catalogued as Lot 48.
The strength of the Hong Kong market, so often the determinant of the success, or otherwise, of a Australasian two-year-old sale, came to the fore early in the one-day session with Denys Chan’s Golden River operation purchasing Lot 6, a colt by Deep Field, for $280,000 from Hannover Lodge while Ian Sham and Bridle Bloodstock parted with $210,000 to secure a Capitalist (Written Tycoon) colt for $210,000 from Glenn Haven Thoroughbreds. He was catalogued as Lot 8.
The Macau Jockey Club, on behalf of its members, was also active yesterday, purchasing nine juveniles including a Deep Field gelding for $240,000 from Glenn Haven. Buyers from the Philippines also purchased two two-year-olds while Singapore’s Jason Ong and Dan Meagher bought one lot apiece.
Trilogy Racing makes immediate impact
The fire brigade was called to Riverside Stables about an hour prior to the start of the the sale, but the real heat was felt soon after 11am when Lot 1, a son of Haunui Farm shuttler Belardo (Lope De Vega), immediately lit up the sales ring when he was purchased for $320,000 to the bid of relatively new investor Jason Stenning.
He would later add a colt by Fastnet Rock (Danehill) from the draft of Shaun Nolen’s JCS Thoroughbreds to his portfolio after he secured the youngster for $340,000.
The NSW Central Coast-based Stenning and his wife Melanie’s Trilogy Racing might not be well-known, but if their past few months’ activity is any guide, that won’t be the case for much longer with about 30 horses already on the books.
Caithness Breeding’s Sean Dingwall has been advising the Stennings.
“We bought about six weanlings up at the Magic Millions, so we started that way and since then we have picked up a few broodmares,” Stenning revealed.
“We started off thinking we’d buy a few horses and have a bit of fun and now we’re working on a business model.”
The Belardo colt, who breezed on the Cambridge Synthetic track in 11.27 seconds, was purchased for NZ$140,000 from the NZB Karaka Yearling Sale by the partnership of Upper Bloodstock, Legends Bloodstock, Regal Farm and agent Phill Cataldo.
He is the first foal out of the unraced mare Keepabreak (Keeper), a half-sister to Hong Kong stakes winner More Bountiful (Van Nistelrooy).
“To get that first one of the day kind of gets that locked away – there’s nothing worse than going home empty handed, right?” Stenning said.
“We thought he’d make around $150,000 to $200,000. There was another one we really wanted but he just didn’t pass the vet screening, so we had a bit of a gap in what we wanted to get, so we were prepared to spend a bit more on the Belardo.”
Emerging young Wangaratta trainer Ben Brisbourne will prepare the Regal Farm-consigned colt for the Stennings.
“(Brisbourne) is very close to Sean and we wanted to be a bigger fish in a smaller pond,” the Trilogy Racing principal said.
Meanwhile, Wyong-based Kristen Buchanan will train the Fastnet Rock colt, who breezed in 10.39 seconds at Seymour. Catalogued as Lot 119, he is the first living foal out of Annata Lady (High Chaparral), a half-sister to stakes-winning miler Religify (Choisir).
“This is the main one we came for and we got him, so I am really happy,” Stenning said.
“I have got some good people in my corner with good experience and multi-generational advice, so we are getting the right advice and we’re listening.
“We are trying to get the right balance. We need the quality but we also need the numbers there to work through as well. We will see what we can develop at the moment.”
Trilogy Racing also went to $160,000 late in the day for a Nolen Racing-consigned colt by Aquis Farm-based sire Invader (Snitzel), who was prepared on behalf of Avesta Bloodstock’s Jimmy Unwala and partners, while they also took home colts by Capitalist ($100,000) and More Than Ready (Southern Halo) ($65,000).
Following an outlay of $985,00 from five lots purchased, Trilogy Racing ended the session as the sale’s leading buyer, while Amanda Turner filled second position by that metric.
The most active buyer was the Macau Jockey Club with their nine purchases.
More than $11 million traded at Ready2Race
Like much of the past two years, Inglis was forced to adapt to the ever-changing pandemic conditions, thus management chose to push back the Ready2Race Sale by a fortnight so it could take place after the NSW government had relaxed restrictions in the state.
The market, which hit a lull after Lot 1’s barnstorming entrance, picked up significantly in the afternoon to lead to a record aggregate of $11,736,500 (it closed at $11,642,000 last year after the sale of passed in lots were completed) and an average of $113,947 after 103 horses changed hands as of last night.
The names Turner and Trilogy Racing featuring high up at the top of the buyers list may have come as a surprise to many observers, but not so for Inglis general manager of bloodstock sales and marketing Sebastian Hutch.
“We worked really hard to canvas a broad cross-section of people for the sale, be they domestic or international,” Hutch said last night.
“This is a concept that we are heavily invested in. We want to see it do well; we believe it can do well and it is a format that has the capacity to grow further, as it has in the States and Europe.
“We’ve been promoting this sale for three months and I think we came this week fairly confident that we were going to have engagement from a broad cross-section of people.”
The clearance rate, which in the morning was around 45 to 50 per cent, had increased to 82 per cent at the time of writing and Hutch says the figure can increase in the coming days.
“For a sale like this, there is obviously a challenge of vendors trying to meet the market. They put a lot of time, a lot of money, a lot of effort to get these horses to this point, so inevitably there’s an inclination on the part of a number of vendors to try and set a value on these horses and protect them to that point, so the sale took a little while to find its mark,” Hutch said.
“We look like we’re going to land on a clearance rate of somewhere (above) 80 per cent, which is really fantastic for a sale of this kind.
“The fact that there was so much competition on the better lots right from the get-go gave real confidence to the market and, certainly, in the second half of the day there felt like there was real urgency to the buying.”
At the close of trade, Newgate Farm-based Deep Field (Northern Meteor) was crowned the leading sire by aggregate with eight of his progeny selling for total receipts of $1,160,000, while late Cambridge Stud sire Tavistock (Montjeu) led the way in terms of average (with three or more lots sold) having had four juveniles sell for a gross of $725,000 at an average of $181,250.
Yesterday, buyers from Hong Kong purchased eight lots for an aggregate of $2.06 million which equates to 17.55 per cent of the market share, which is on par with their spending 12 months ago when they spent $2.040 million at a market share of 18.61 per cent.
Purchasers from New South Wales outlayed $5.038 million for 45 lots and finished with a market share of 45.93 per cent and they increased their spend from 12 months ago, when they finished with a gross of $4.244 million and 38.71 per cent of the share.
Buyers from Victoria purchased 21 two-year-olds for a total spend of $1.94 million making up 16.53 per cent of the market and their activity was down on the 2020 spend, when they forked out $2.311 million on two-year-olds which equated to 21.08 per cent of the market.
Magic Millions will hold its version, the 2YOs In Training Sale, on November 8 before New Zealand Bloodstock conducts its two-day virtual auction on November 17 and 18.
The move away from the Karaka complex in Auckland was confirmed yesterday, with the sale moving to a virtual format at Te Rapa.