Australian Bloodstock turn attentions to the West

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There are not many jurisdictions where Australian Bloodstock doesn’t look to source or race horses and Western Australia is the NSW-based operation’s next frontier.

The syndication business of Jamie Lovett and Luke Murrell has been built on the back of tried horse imports from Europe and Japan and, just this week, they added a $1 million half-sister to Group 1 winner Booker (Written Tycoon) and Listed winner Banquo (Written Tycoon) by I Am Invincible from the Inglis Easter sale, who will be trained on the east coast.

However, Lovett revealed Australian Bloodstock was also now exploring opportunities to expand into Perth. 

“There’s demand over there for syndication, to be honest, so we’ve been approached by a few owners [to look at WA],” Lovett said. 

“We’re a bit guarded to go in too heavy because I don’t want to get caught owning half of the horses myself, but I would be quite keen to explore it further.”

Grant and Alana Williams, who are working hard to expand their business as public trainers after splitting with leading owner Bob Peters in late 2021, will train horses for Australian Bloodstock.

“They are well-credentialed trainers and prize-money is great over there … we’ll put a few with Grant and Alana and see how they go. 

“I’d like to get some tried horses over there to get up and running, get the colours around and hopefully we can go from there.”

Lovett added: “There’s so much money in WA and there doesn’t seem to be a model over there where you’re getting your [owners taking] smaller shares. We think there’s a little opening there, but, again, we haven’t invested too heavily at the moment, we’re dipping our toes in the water.”

As ANZ Bloodstock News reported yesterday, Newcastle-based Lovett and Murrell welcomed their imported Group 1-winning sprinter Brave Smash closer to home, with the former Aquis Farm resident to stand in the Hunter Valley at Yarraman Park. 

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Less than 48 hours after I Wish I Win won the TJ Smith and Major Beel won the Australian Derby last weekend, Waikato Stud’s Garry Chittick was reinvesting a big share of what he and son Mark won in prize-money.

I Wish I Win is majority owned by Waikato while they have 25 per cent of Major Beel, a horse they bred and sold at the Gold Coast in 2021. The pair earned connections more than $3.1 million with the Randwick Group 1 double.

“We have had good days here before. One year we were lucky enough to win the Oaks with Daffodil the year Vision And Power won the Doncaster and Swick won a Group 1 in Melbourne, so you have those days in Melbourne, but I’ve been doing this a long time” an understandably husky voiced Garry Chittick said of the Kiwis’ success in Sydney.

It prompted Garry to make a whistle stop trip to Riverside, buying Lot 8 for $825,000 before jetting off again. The Sledmere Stud-sold I Am Invincible filly, who will be trained by I Wish I Win’s trainer Peter Moody, is a sister to Group 1 winner Invincibella and a half-sister to takes winners Secret Blaze (Sizzling) and Extreme Flight (Extreme Choice).

The investment was more impromptu than planned, although Inglis provided the breeder with a shortlist before the sale, while the filly also carried the endorsement of Sledmere’s Royston Murphy.

“I just arrived here, I looked at the catalogue – we retain a lot of fillies to keep our broodmare band up – but I thought ‘if you’re going to buy a filly, you’ve got to buy one that measures up with what you’ve got at home otherwise, what’s the point?’.

“Jonathan D’Arcy sent me through a list and she was on it. I had just arrived on the ground, so if Peter Moody didn’t like her and I didn’t trust Royston, I wouldn’t have bought her.”

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Grahame Begg, well-known for his patience as a trainer, has three very talented horses in his stable at the moment: three-year-old fillies Magic Time (Hellbent) and C’est Magique (Zoustar) as well as four-year-old Passive Aggressive (Fastnet Rock).

The Milburn Creek-bred and owned Magic Time, unbeaten in three starts, will look to back-up last Saturday’s PJ Bell Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) win with victory in the JHB Carr Stakes (Gr 3, 1400m) at Randwick on April 15.

The Empire Rose (Gr 1, 1600m) at Flemington, the scene of her stakes win during the spring, is a probable target next campaign.

Passive Aggressive, unplaced in the TJ Smith, will continue her preparation by heading to Adelaide in May for the Robert Sangster (Gr 1, 1200m) but C’est Magique has returned to the paddock.

C’est Magique was runner-up to In Secret in last October’s Coolmore Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) but she hasn’t been seen since due to a virus.

“She was due to have a jump-out but she had a temperature and her blood picture wasn’t right,” Begg said. 

“We got her over that and we were getting her ready again and we were hopeful of taking her over to Adelaide or something like that but I just couldn’t find the right lead up races for her, so we made the conscious decision, ‘Ok, let’s just pull up stumps and just concentrate on the spring.

“She’s a highly promising filly, running second in a Coolmore at her fourth start in a race, and we think there’s great things ahead of her.”

Grahame’s father, Australian Racing Hall Of Fame inductee Neville Begg, a spritely 92, was at Riverside and he agreed with his son to take a patient approach with his homebred filly C’est Magique, the half-sister to his Blue Diamond-winning Widden Stud sire Written By.  

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For racing families, there’s probably never a clear weekend for people to get married without missing a meeting or an industry event, but it did raise eyebrows when the Botts, trainer Adrian and Evergreen Stud Farm vendor Aaron, were absent from Randwick and Inglis’ Riverside Stables respectively on Saturday.

The brothers were instead at their sister Aneeka’s wedding. Adrian co-trained Major Beel to win the Group 1 Australian Derby on day one of The Championships, but he left it to assistant Neil Paine to collect the trophy.

Aaron relied upon his staff to care for and parade the three Easter sale yearlings Evergreen was offering – and subsequently sold.

“The Derby was just after (the vows), so at least she timed it well,” Adrian Bott said.  

More seriously, he added: “I never pressured, questioned or put any sort of guilt on her at all. I was very happy for her. I was there to support her and enjoy the day. We were able to send her off (into married life) with a nice ceremony.”

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Troy Corstens was not at the Easter sale, either, not on Saturday nor on any day for that matter, with the popular Victorian trainer laid low by a broken leg as a result of a skiing accident during a recent trip to Japan. 

The setback for Corstens, whose sprinter The Astrologist did the stable and Australian racing proud in Dubai on World Cup night and who is bound for Royal Ascot, comes not that long after he suffered significant facial injuries in a cycling accident in Melbourne last July. 

As one of his mates remarked this week: “He’d break a finger playing chess at the moment.”

Get well soon, Troy, and please make sure things don’t come in threes.