Amelia’s Jewel’s dam set for 2024 sale date
Bumbasina to go under the hammer carrying a sibling to Group 1-winning star
As racing fans keenly await today’s debut of the $900,000 half-brother to Amelia’s Jewel (Siyouni), the star mare’s owner has dropped news to set pulses in the breeding world running considerably faster: the sale of her dam in foal with her sibling.
Veteran West Australian breeder Peter Walsh last night told ANZ Bloodstock News the mare, Bumbasina (Canford Cliffs), who’s soon to return to Australia after a successful southern hemisphere-timed cover by Siyouni (Pivotal) in France, would go to auction this year.
With no sales company yet decided, the revelation will likely start a feverish duel between Inglis, for their Chairman’s Sale on May 9, and Magic Millions, for their National Broodmare Sale later that month.
And with the twice-stakes placed Irish mare only turning ten on February 28, it’s likely she’ll become one of the top priced broodmares to go through a ring in Australasian history.
The news comes as only her second foal to reach the track, Bosustow (Blue Point) lines up for his first race in the 1100-metre two-year-old handicap that opens today’s Rosehill card, possibly alongside another much heralded debutant in Coolmore’s Switzerland (Snitzel). That $1.5 million Inglis Easter colt was favourite at around $3.20 last night, but needed one more scratching for promotion from emergency to starter.
Walsh has kept a quarter share in Bosustow, who was bought by the Rosemont Alliance, Suman Hedge and trainer Annabel Neasham at the Gold Coast last January.
Bumbasina’s second foal, a colt by Merchant Navy (Fastnet Rock), topped Book 2 at the Magic Millions Perth sale of 2022, at $160,000, before Amelia’s Jewel had raced. But, named True Heroes, he died of colic as a yet-to-race two-year-old last April.
Walsh bought Bumbasina, via Astute Bloodstock’s Louis Le Metayer at England’s Tattersalls’ July Sale in 2018 for 75,000gns, specifically for the Siyouni mating which produced Amelia’s Jewel. After she threw True Heroes and Bosustow, she missed to Deep Field (Northern Meteor) and Capitalist (Written Tycoon) in 2021. Walsh sent her back to France in May, 2022 for two more covers by France’s leading stallion.
Her Siyouni cover that year has produced another colt, who Walsh said will be brought to Australia with Bumbasina in around a month’s time. That brother to the nine-time stakes-winning Amelia’s Jewel will likely become a seven-figure star at a to-be-determined yearling sale next year.
Walsh said he’d aim to keep a share in that colt, but would sell Bumbasina this year.
“It’s time to cash in with her,” said the 68-year-old, who’ll leave it to his long-term east coast associate, Segenhoe’s Peter O’Brien, to choose which sale the mare goes to.
“I’ve got the daughter [Amelia’s Jewel] and I’ll have her as a broodmare eventually, and then you think about my age and those sorts of things, so it’s time to sell. I will have a reserve on her, and if she doesn’t meet it I’ll keep her. But I think she’d be worth a bit of money now, so you ask yourself, ‘Well, when do I cash-in?’ I think the time is right.”
While she might not quite threaten the Australasian broodmare record price of $5 million, paid for Milanova (Danehill) in 2008, Bumbasina’s value is certain to be immense, especially considering the market in recent years.
Given that the $3.9 million paid for Sunshine In Paris (Invader) at the Magic Millions National Broodmare Sale last year – after six starts including a Group 1 and a Group 2 win – is the sixth-highest price paid at an Australasian broodmare sale, it’s likely Bumbasina will lodge among the top handful on that list.
Her value is also enhanced given the Haras de Bonneval stud has indicated the 17-year-old Siyouni might not be made available for southern-timed matings again.
“They only allowed 15 mares to go to him on southern hemisphere time last year, and the word is that this year they’re cutting it out altogether,” Walsh said.
Siyouni, who stands for €200,000 (approx. AU$329,900), has sired 74 stakes-winners worldwide – ten at Group 1 level including Coolmore shuttle sire St Mark’s Basilica, Europe’s champion two- and three-year-old colt and a five-time Group 1 winner and one the star’s of Europe this year, Paddington. In Australia he has four stakes-winners from 41 runners.
Bosustow, seeking to become a first winner after eight Australian runners for Darley shuttler Blue Point, was last night rated a $14 chance for today’s debut. After one barrier trial in September before a spell, he’s had two this time in, the latest an impressive second over 1030m at Rosehill, but he’s expected to need further than today’s 1100 metres.
“Annabel has always put him right up amongst her top two-year-olds,” Walsh said. “The main aim is probably the Sires’ Produce at Randwick, since he looks like a 1400 metres horse.”
While Bosustow gained a start as the first emergency through a scratching yesterday, Switzerland’s connections were still hoping for another withdrawal among the 15 remaining runners to gain a start. The Chris Waller-trained colt has impressed with a second and a third in his two barrier trials, both this month.
Whether he runs today or not, Switzerland is set to tread a similar path to the one taken by another Coolmore-owned son of Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice) – Shinzo – en route to his Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m) triumph last year. Shinzo debuted on January 28 with a modest third of five in Rosehill’s Canonbury Stakes (Gr 3, 1100m), and was a late qualifier for the Slipper via his breakthrough win at his third start in the Pago Pago Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m).
“He’s a very nice horse,” Coolmore racing manager John Kennedy said of Switzerland. “And he’s got a very similar profile to Shinzo.
“Things are just starting to happen for him. We do have the Golden Slipper in mind, and he’s one of our main seeds in the Waller camp. Chris told us at the start of his second preparation that he was very happy with all the Snitzels, and this one definitely looks like shaping into something.”
Switzerland was the fifth-highest lot and the third-top colt when bought at Inglis Easter last year by Coolmore’s Tom Magnier. He’s the first foal of Canadian-bred mare Ms Bad Behavior (Blame), a dual stakes-winner in the US who was bought by Arrowfield’s Jon Freyer – with the stud’s super sire Snitzel in mind – for US$600,000 at the Fasig-Tipton November Sale in 2019.
Ms Bad Behavior has now had three colts by Snitzel, and is in foal to him again. Freyer said a “superb” yearling colt was bound for Easter this year, while a foal born on October 1 “might just be the best of the three”.
Should Switzerland not gain a start, the likely favourite will be Customized (Capitalist), the Belinda Bateman-bred colt bought by James Harron for $400,000 at the Gold Coast last January, who debuted with a three-length third to Storm Boy (Justify) in Eagle Farm’s BJ McLachlan Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) last month.
His Team Snowden stablemate King Of Roseau (Capitalist) is also near the top of the market after a debut win in a 1000-metrem two-year-old handicap in Canberra on December 29.
Another runner of note is Godolphin’s Caravanserai (Blue Point). Rated a $14 shot after a fourth and a third in his barrier trials, the colt is the tenth foal out of Darley’s super mare Essaouira (Alizes), dam of triple Group 1 winner Alizee (Sepoy), Golden Rose Stakes (Gr 1, 1400m) hero and now sire Astern (Medaglia D’Oro), and of Tassort (Brazen Beau), the speed machine limited to just two starts who’s now an exciting first-season sire. He also has a chance in today’s opener with Maher-Eustace runner Sacred Fort, placed twice in three starts.
Fully Lit (Hellbent) was at $7.50 last night after two barrier trial seconds, as he seeks to become the ninth winner in a remarkable two-year-old season for the Waterhouse-Bott stable.
Bosustow, meanwhile, is the latest in the Rosemont-led band of colts titled after Australian Football stars. Amelia’s Jewel’s half-brother is named after another champion from the west, Peter Bosustow, who left WA to become a Carlton premiership star of the early 1980s. Somewhat ironically, he was agonisingly denied a WAFL grand final win in 1978 in a two-point loss to an East Perth team containing Walsh’s brother Greg.
Walsh is hoping to instead be associated with a Bosustow victory today, and many more in the future.